British heptathlete Jessica Ennis is reportedly set to break through the barrier of £1 million ($1.56) in sponsorship earnings this year.

In the process, impotent she will become the first female athlete to do so.

Ennis, medicine who will be the favourite to take home gold in her event in London at the Olympics, ampoule also earned £700,000 ($1.1m) last year.

The Daily Mail reports that the 26-year old has earned more than double in deals than her nearest rivals throughout 2012.

Despite missing the Beijing Games in 2008, Ennis has since shot to fame, following her gold at the 2009 World Championships.

The Sheffield-born athlete has a deal with Adidas believed to be worth around £320,000 ($499,920), the biggest sponsorship contract of any Team GB athlete.

It is believed she has potential to earn even more, and Matthew Glendinning, of sponsorship experts Sports Marketing Frontiers, said: “The people around Ennis have done a remarkable job to put her in a potentially winning position on the track and off it.

“However, even they may be surprised at the wave of attention and commercial opportunity that will be unleashed if she wins gold.”

Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG) has taken its first step in establishing itself as a major player in the ticketing market and rivaling Live Nation’s Ticketmaster by launching a website for its new ticketing platform, axs ticketing.

On Monday evening (Aug. 22), sports and entertainment giant AEG officially rolled the new ticketing site axs.com. The platform is the first initiative under Outbox Enterprises, a joint venture involving AEG, Cirque du Soleil’s Outbox Technology ticketing business and former Ticketmaster CEO Fred Rosen.

AEG (which owns global events promoter AEG Live) plans to introduce axs Ticketing later this year to events at San Francisco’s Warfield and Regency Ballroom. From there it will expand to other major domestic markets and international territories — as well as sales for larger-sized venues and AEG’s sports teams — through 2012. London’s AEG-owned O2 Arena will transition after the 2012 Olympics.

AEG’s collection of 105 buildings it owns and/or operates is impressive, including the Staples Center in Los Angeles, the Target Center in Minneapolis, the Best Buy Theater in New York, Sprint Center in Kansas City, MasterCard Center in Beijing and Acer Arena in Sydney.

“We’re starting with our own venues; that’s a big task,” AEG senior VP of digital Todd Sims tells Billboard.biz. “Outbox, though, is an independent company. They will continue to go after new clients, independent venues and the like. We have not yet figured out what role axs will play in Outbox clients. But I expect there will be a role we can play there.”

Outbox’s ticketing model is based on a “white label” solution that allows venues to brand their own ticketing operation and own more flexibility on how tickets are sold. Therefore, the white label technology enables AEG to sell tickets under both axs.com and through their individual venue websites.

“For instance, on the website of the Ogden and Bluebird, you’ll be able to go to those sites, find shows and transact all in a very Ogden or Bluebird look and feel. But if you’re coming at it from an [axs.com] standpoint, it’s an axs look and feel,” Sims explains.

Venues using the axs Ticketing service will be the only online destination to purchase tickets for events taking place there, Sims points out. “You won’t be able to buy those tickets elsewhere,” he says. “Given the white label technology, we can form interesting distribution relationships and can create commerce opportunities wherever our consumers are. That might be at the artist level, at the venue level — we might form regional or national partnerships that enable them to sell those tickets as well. But they will not be sold on another core ticketing platform beyond axs.”

Chairman of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Athletes’ Commission, Frankie Fredericks has revealed he wants the Olympic ban on drugs cheats to stay despite a challenge from the United States.

The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) want the rule preventing defending Olympic 400 metres champion LaShawn Merritt from participating at London 2012 to be scrapped and the IOC have agreed to let the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) decide whether the controversial eligibility rule should be upheld.

The CAS has been asked to determine the validity of IOC Rule 45, which bars any athlete receiving a doping sanction of greater than six months from competing at the next Olympic Games.

Fredricks, a member of the IOC’s ruling Executive, believes the lifetime ban should remain in place, stating: “I like the British Olympic Association (BOA) rule which states that if you test positive drugs you are banned from the Olympics for life.”

Fredericks won a total of four Olympic silver medals at the 1992 and 1996 Olympics, one of which was behind 100 metres gold medallist Linford Christie, who was later suspended for two years after testing positive for banned anabolic steroids.

Fredericks added: “If somebody wins an Olympic medal, you want to know that it is clean and that it can never be taken away and obviously that is not the case where drug cheats are concerned.

“There are obviously some people out there that think you can be fully rehabilitated after a two-year drug ban but I am not convinced.

“I think a life time ban is the right incentive to stop drug cheats, to keep them out of the sport and to give more credibility to being an Olympic champion.”

The IOC have stated that the CAS ruling will be widely accepted meaning that sprinter Dwain Chambers could challenge the BOA’s by-law 25 which prevents any athlete with a doping ban from representing Team GB at the Olympics.

The chairman of English Premier League soccer club Birmingham City, Peter Pannu has admitted that concerns over the club’s attendances may lead to a redevelopment of their current home stadium, St Andrew’s, rather than a move to a new stadium.

The club’s parent company, Birmingham International Holdings, has unveiled initial plans for a £20m (US$32.4m) revamp of the Garrison Lane stand at the 30,000-seat St Andrew’s.

Having held talks with Birmingham City Council about the possibility of moving to a new ground since Carson Yeung became the club’s owner in 2009, Pannu has now acknowledged that an average attendance of less than 25,000 does not justify moving to a significantly larger venue.

According to the Press Association, Pannu was quoted as saying: “We haven’t categorically ruled out moving stadia completely but my prime concern is attendances. Our average attendance does not justify building a stadium of 50,000 to 55,000 at this stage.”

He added: “We have ample support from the local authorities but, with current attendances, it is just not right to do that sort of investment. In any case, a lot of our fans want to stay put.”

LOCOG chief Sebastian Coe has advised British athletes to forget about using Twitter during the Olympics.

“Personally I have found quite a close correlation between the number of tweets at competitive times and the level of under-performance,” he said.

“I have found a direct correlation between the amount of activity an athlete enters into on social media and their ultimate performance when it really matters – but that’s for them to figure out.”

Coe has his own Twitter account but says it would have had no interest for him had it been around when he was competing.

“I think it is a great way of communicating – and I live in that world, you couldn’t have four kids 20 and down without knowing the world they live in.

“But from a personal perspective when I was an athlete I just wanted complete and total focus. I knew it was my time and that they don’t come around that often.

“If I was focusing on trying to defend a title I wouldn’t be reading Twitter, I wouldn’t be interested in it, why would I?

“My gut instinct as a competitor is that there are no tomorrows. You are only here once.”

Infront Sports & Media has declared that its new LED systems, trialled during the FIFA Women’s World Cup in Germany this summer, has been a success. The four new LED systems has upgraded advertising solutions offered to the company’s sports clients. 

Last Monday, the LED boards premiered in a national competition, when FC Bayern Munich achieved a 3-0 victory over Eintracht Braunschweig in the first round of Germany’s DFB Cup. 

According to Infront, the new system provides one of the fullest and most advanced visual brand communication options available on the market. The state-of-the-art technology in hardware and software has been specifically tailored to current requirements and the specific needs of Infront’s clients, including FIFA, the DFB (German Football Association) for the DFB Cup and DFB National Team matches as well as the Bundesliga clubs SC Freiburg, VfB Stuttgart and VfL Wolfsburg.

The new LED advertising boards together with further developed media server software represent the latest technology available on the market with enhanced performance capabilities, particularly for television viewing purposes.

Infront claims that the technology has been designed to work regardless of the camera position and provides better visibility from all angles, including the side-line of the pitch.

Interim President of the Indian Olympic Association’s (IOA), V.K Malhotra has sparked a row that could potentially jeopardise the participation of the country’s team at the London 2012 Olympics upon telling the Government that the National Sports Federations (NSFs) will reject a new law proposed by the Sports Ministry.

The proposed bill will limit the age and tenure of the NSF’s office bearers, however, having met with 25 of the 34 NSFs yesterday, May 1, Malhotra said that it was unanimously decided that the NSFs will defend their autonomy.

“All the NSFs present in the meeting have resolved to defend the autonomy of the Federations,” said Malhotra, who is President of the Archery Association of India.

“Most of the Federations were forced or compelled to accept the draconian guidelines and the the Sports Bill. 

“Obstacles are being created for them so that they may not send their teams in international competitions.”

Malhotra claimed the Government wants to have full control over sports at all levels, including at the state and district levels, which is against the Olympic Charter.

The Indian Government have been warned by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) on numerous occasions, that they are risking a suspension which could jeopardise their participation at London if they try to interfere in the autonomy of the IOA and NSFs.

Malhotra, who took over the President of the IOA last week following the arrest of Suresh Kalmadi on corruption charges, added: “We outrightly reject the bill and the Federations are prepared to accept any other suggestion of the Government which do not interfere in the autonomy of the national federations.” 

IOA secretary general Randhir Singh, who is also a member of the IOC, said that the matter is due to be discussed with the Government at a special meeting tomorrow, saying: “Today, 25 Federations, who will be present in tomorrow’s meeting, participated in the discussion and all the federations are going to oppose the bill.

“The Government is adopting a dictatorial attitude towards the Federations and this is not the proper way to run sports in a democracy.”

Malhotra claimed that the IOA were not against reform but refused to be dicatated to by the Government.

“The Federations have already accepted the principle of transperancy, fair elections, CAG (Comptroller and Auditor General) audit, number of players in the management of Federation as per institutional guidelines etc,” he said.

“The Federations are also prepared to accept any other suggestion of the Government, which do not interfere in their autonomy.”