(Bloomberg) -- Washington Commanders owner Josh Harris said his record-breaking $6 billion deal for the NFL team has helped push the league toward allowing institutional investors into its ownership ranks.

Harris, the co-founder of Apollo Global Management, led a group of more than 15 investors who bought the Commanders last year. 

“Raising $3 billion is a lot of work,” Harris said Wednesday at the Bloomberg Invest Summit in New York. “It was the ability to raise the capital that got that deal.”

That process, he said, focused the the league on making future sales easier by allowing private equity and other institutional investors to own stakes in teams, a step other US sports leagues have already taken. While Harris was not allowed to include institutional investors in his bid for the Commanders, the NFL is considering lifting its restriction. 

The NFL’s owners discussed proposed changes at meetings in Nashville in May, but didn’t vote. Commissioner Roger Goodell said he expects a vote by the end of this year. As valuations for NFL teams have risen into the billions of dollars, the list of people who can afford to buy a team has grown increasingly short. Allowing institutional investors to own stakes, Harris said, would help valuations continue to grow. 

“The NFL is intelligently saying let’s take a look at that,” Harris said.

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