Reports: Donald Sterling Agrees To Sell Clippers, Drop Lawsuit Against NBA

(RTTNews) - Donald Sterling has agreed to sell the Los Angeles Clippers to Steve Ballmer, the former chief executive officer of Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), for a record $2 billion and also drop his lawsuit against the National Basketball Association or NBA, according to media reports on Wednesday.

Los Angeles Clippers is an American professional basketball team based in Los Angeles, California, that competes in the NBA. The $2 billion sale figure sets the record for purchase price of an NBA franchise, tripling the previous record holder.

Ballmer reportedly outbid two other groups that made bids for the Los Angeles Clippers. A group including former NBA All-Star Grant Hill, Ares Management, L.P. (ARES) Chairman Antony Ressler and Oaktree Capital Group LLC's (OAK) co-founder Bruce Karsh is said to have made a $1.2 billion bid for the Los Angeles Clippers.

Another group that included music executive David Geffen, Oracle Corp. (ORCL) Chief Executive Officer Larry Ellison, Oprah Winfrey, and executives from Guggenheim Partners, owners of baseball's Los Angeles Dodgers, reportedly bid $1.6 billion for the club.

Sterling, the owner of Los Angeles Clippers, has now reportedly given his consent to a deal negotiated by his wife, Shelly Sterling, to sell the team to Ballmer. He is said to have sued the NBA in federal court last week for $1 billion, alleging that the NBA violated his constitutional rights and that he was forced by the league to sell the Los Angeles Clippers.

Shelly Sterling has presided over the sale of the club after the NBA banned her husband for life and fined him $2.5 million in April for making racist comments.

The sale of the club to Ballmer must now be approved by the NBA owners, for which a vote is expected to take place in mid-July. Twenty-three of the thirty team owners in the league must approve the sale.