<P> Interbrand competition returned with the reestablishment of the brand extension in 2016; the first interbrand match that occurred after the brand extension went into full effect was at SummerSlam on August 21, 2016 where Raw's Brock Lesnar defeated SmackDown's Randy Orton . The next large interbrand matches occurred at Survivor Series on November 20, 2016, where there were three traditional Survivor Series elimination tag team matches between Raw and SmackDown, which included a 5 - on - 5 match for male wrestlers, a 5 - on - 5 match for female wrestlers, and a 10 - on - 10 match between the brands' male tag teams . There were two other interbrand matches with SmackDown's The Miz defeating Raw's Sami Zayn to retain the Intercontinental Championship, and Raw's The Brian Kendrick retained the WWE Cruiserweight Championship against SmackDown's Kalisto; if Kalisto won, the entire cruiserweight division of Raw would have moved to SmackDown . Survivor Series has now become an event where wrestlers of Raw face off against wrestlers of SmackDown and the brand with the most wins claims brand supremacy . The 2017 event, in addition to two traditional Survivor Series elimination matches (one 5 - on - 5 male match and one 5 - on - 5 female match), every champion of the Raw brand faced their counterpart champion of the SmackDown brand (with the exception of the WWE Cruiserweight Championship due to it not having a SmackDown counterpart). </P> <P> The separation of the WWE roster between two brands also intended to split the pay - per - view offerings, which began with Bad Blood in June 2003 . The original idea had the "major" pay - per - view events at the time (Royal Rumble, SummerSlam, Survivor Series, and WrestleMania) would contain the only instances where wrestlers from different brands would interact with each other, and even among the four shows only the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania would have wrestlers from different brands competing against each other . Wrestlers, as a result, appeared only in two - thirds of the shows in a given year, and thus appeared in fewer shows compared to before the brand extension . With single - brand PPVs in place, WWE was able to add more pay - per - view events to their offerings, such as Taboo Tuesday / Cyber Sunday, New Year's Revolution, December to Dismember, and The Great American Bash . Eventually, WWE abandoned the practice of single - brand pay - per - view events following WrestleMania 23 . December to Dismember and New Year's Revolution were cancelled following the announcement . </P> <P> With the reintroduction of the brand extension in 2016, single - branded pay - per - view events returned, and seven more pay - per - view events were added to for 2017 so that each brand could have their own pay - per - view each month, in addition to the four major pay - per - views, in which both brands were involved . The only exception to this were the two months leading up to WrestleMania 33 in order to build the feuds for that event, and the two months (including the month of WrestleMania) following WrestleMania to begin new feuds for each brand . For example, February 2017 only had a SmackDown pay - per - view while March only had one for Raw . WrestleMania 33 was on April 2 and Raw had its first post-WrestleMania pay - per - view on April 30, while only SmackDown had a pay - per - view in May . This also happened in 2018, however, for 2018, WWE announced that all pay - per - views following WrestleMania 34 would be dual - branded, abandoning the single - brand practice for a second time . The 2018 Elimination Chamber and Fastlane events are the last two brand - exclusive pay - per - views for Raw and SmackDown, respectively . </P> <P> Initially, the Undisputed WWE Championship and the original WWE Women's Championship were available to both brands . The other championships were exclusive to the brand the champion was a part of . When the brand extension began, Raw received the Intercontinental Championship and European Championship when their respective holders were drafted, while SmackDown became the exclusive home for the World Tag Team Championship and the original Cruiserweight Championship . With several specialty championships being exclusive to one brand, numerous wrestlers were left with no title to fight for except for the Hardcore Championship, which although a property of SmackDown after the draft, it was contested under different rules than the other championships--the European and Hardcore championships were later unified with the Intercontinental Championship in July and August 2002, respectively, deactivating both championships . </P>

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