McLaren Racing announced a new multi-year partnership with K-Swiss, a Los Angeles-based heritage footwear brand, as an official partner of the McLaren Formula 1 team from 2023.
K-Swiss has nearly 60 years of heritage in creating footwear and will enter Formula 1 for the first time with McLaren to evolve its presence and reach new consumers globally. The partnership joins two brands with a strong history in their respective fields with an emphasis on elevated performance.
McLaren and K-Swiss will create a bespoke performance-based footwear collection, designed to be worn by McLaren pit crews and engineers at race events globally. The two brands will also collaborate on a footwear and limited apparel collection which will be available to consumers.
The team will work with K-Swiss to activate at tentpole moments globally, including key races on the Formula 1 calendar.
Lindsey Eckhouse, Director of Licensing, ecommerce & esports, McLaren Racing, said:
“It is a pleasure to welcome K-Swiss to the McLaren Racing family and Formula 1. We are excited to work with a brand which has such a strong heritage and can provide our team with footwear that is reliable with a focus on performance while looking fantastic. I can’t wait for the release of the collection.”
Dave Grange, International Brand President, K-Swiss, said:
“We are honoured to be part of this exciting new and multi-year partnership and are looking forward to be joining McLaren on the racetrack. Each brand boasts a heritage that reflects the other’s, replete with perseverance, innovation, and excellence. We hope that with this new partnership we develop a new base of loyalists and extend our legacies further.”
Range Sports have become the new official uniform sponsor of British Taekwondo National Teams
British Taekwondo and Range Sports are pleased to announce a new partnership between the two organisations helping to strengthen relationships and provide high quality uniforms to members of our national teams.
The two-year official sponsorship agreement will see Range Sports support British Taekwondo national team. These include the British Taekwondo Cadet, Under-21, Poomsae & Para Poomsae national teams.
Kambiz Ali said “Range Sports & JC UK are thrilled to support and sponsor British Taekwondo and look forward to a growing partnership with our National Governing Body.”
Ian Leafe, Chief Executive of British Taekwondo said “This is the start of an extremely exciting period of growth for British Taekwondo and we have several significant developments over the coming years. A key part of our evolution is the development of a commercial partnership programme, and we are incredibly pleased to announce our new partnership with Range Sports.”
The sponsorship will kick off with Jcalicu uniforms being supplied to the National Teams at the World Taekwondo Cadet World Championships in Sofia, Bulgaria in July and the European Under-21 Taekwondo Championships in Tirana, Albania in October.
Range Sports is a business with Taekwondo at its heart. Founders Master K. R. Ali and Master Mosy are instructors and 7th and 5th Dan respectively. This gives them the unique ability to understand the needs of Taekwondo practitioners and deliver quality products to enable people to train and perform to their best ability. Range Sports brings the Taekwondo tenets of courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control and indomitable spirit to the business and respects each and every one of their customers.
Range Sports are the UK’s official supplier and Distributor for Jcalicu (JC) World Taekwondo Approved Uniform, Belts, Protective equipment, Training equipment and accessories.
All British Taekwondo instructors can apply for a trade account with Range Sports from their official website.
British Taekwondo is the IOC and World Taekwondo-recognised governing body for Taekwondo in the UK. As well as being a successful Olympic & Paralympic combat sport with high profile athletes, Taekwondo is an accessible, fun and well-structured Martial Art for all ages and abilities, with deep rooted values of integrity and discipline.
The interest in youth basketball is growing across the globe and FIBA has officially launched a new social media channel with NextGen Hoops highlighting the best of the next generation of hoopers.
NextGen Hoops by FIBA has created accounts on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and is a platform covering the youth basketball scene and events on all continents. Powered by FIBA’s committed social media team, the new channel promises to meet the high bar of quality for content long provided by basketball’s global ruling body.
The goal of NextGen Hoops is to make basketball fans aware of all the fascinating stories, intriguing angles, great personalities and wonderful content surrounding the youth game around the world – not to mention highlights from the best youth basketball players across the globe.
Nikon Corporation (Nikon) is pleased to announce its official patronage of The 150th Open which will take place at St Andrew’s from the 14th to the 17th of July.
The Open is the world’s most prestigious tournament, as well as one of the major golfing events. The Open has played host to some of the world’s best players who set out to become the Champion Golfer of the Year. Nikon is proud to have been supporting The Open since 1981.
For next five years, Nikon has renewed its official patronage of The Open, and newly became a patron of the AIG Women’s Open. The broadening of the sponsorship is a reflection of Nikon’s commitment and desire to promote an inclusive and diverse environment for everyone in society.
With Nikon’s respect for athletes, who continuously challenge their own limits, and its wish to enhance its presence worldwide, Nikon will continue to support international sporting events.
Nikon branding will be present around the course during the Championship and the Official Photographers will take images with Nikon cameras. In addition, for the professional photographers covering this event, Nikon Professional Services (NPS) will set up a service depot to offer support and services, including equipment inspections, cleaning, minor repairs, and the loan of equipment.
Manchester City have announced a partnership with one of the worlds leading cryptocurrency platforms, OKX.
The agreement will see OKX featured across the training kit of the Manchester City men’s and women’s first teams. The men’s first team will debut the training kit when returning for their first pre-season training session today, with the women’s team wearing the kit on their return to training next month. OKX was announced as Manchester City’s Official Cryptocurrency Exchange Partner in March.
Haider Rafique, Global Chief Marketing Officer, OKX, said: “The real grit and perseverance is built on the training ground. This is the way we want to nurture new users on our platform. Being Man City’s Official Training Kit Partner helps us extend that mindset from the training ground over to our trading app community. We want our community to learn from that mindset and use our demo trading feature to train for the real exchange just like Man City players train before the beginning of the season. Our partnership with Man City has provided a great platform through which we have the opportunity to educate those curious about crypto and offer those already involved the training they need to participate responsibly.”
OKX’s training kit partnership with Manchester City is based on shared values. Just as Man City emphasises training innovatively to achieve excellence, OKX’s mission is to educate and inform customers in order to make them responsible long-term traders. It is this shared focus on being at the cutting edge of the industry that will lead to a new era of disruptive fan engagement and web3-based experiences.
Roel de Vries, Group Chief Operating Officer, City Football Group, said, “We are pleased to expand our relationship with OKX today, as they become the Official Training Kit Partner of Manchester City. OKX and Man City are aligned on values such as innovation and success and for both parties, everything starts with training and education. Since the initial partnership began in March 2022, we have worked together to ‘supercharge the fan experience’ through a number of exciting content activations ahead of high profile fixtures during the culmination of the 2021/22 season and we look forward to continuing to develop these opportunities over the coming year.”
In line with the training kit announcement, OKX has commissioned renowned street artist Akse P19 and Global Street Art Agency to create artworks featuring Erling Haaland, Jack Grealish, JoãoCancelo and John Stones across four locations in Manchester. The murals will be fitted out with QR codes that fans can scan for a chance to win their very own season ticket in the OKX Hospitality Box.
OKX is also the presenting partner of Manchester City’s first global Trophy Tour since 2019 following the club’s fourth title win in five years. The tour will see Manchester City and OKX take the Premier League trophy to the doorsteps of fans in markets including France, Spain, the UAE, Korea, and, for the first time ever, Mexico, Norway and South Africa.
OKX’s future ambitions with Manchester City include continuing to supercharge the fan experience, providing key learning initiatives and resources to help customers trade responsibly, and delivering programs to empower and enrich the Manchester community.
Volleyball World are delighted to put pen to paper on a strategic partnership with Japanese apparel brand Mizuno.
With a focus on increasing sales and delivering ecommerce objectives, the deal was signed during the Men’s Volleyball Nations League (VNL) event in Osaka, Japan.
Volleyball World CEO, Finn Taylor, said: “I believe our strategy to become the global hub for volleyball fans is exciting for brands like Mizuno, who see the huge commercial potential the sport has to connect them with a highly desirable audience.
“The partnership also assists us in connecting with volleyball fans around the world. This was aware right from the start in our discussions with Mizuno, where the focus has been on leveraging our digital capabilities to help drive sales and build an affinity with the global community of volleyball fans.”
Mark Kaiway, Head of Global Marketing at Mizuno, said: “Mizuno has a long, rich history in the sport of volleyball, and with a new, proud member of the Volleyball World family, we truly believe that their digital capabilities will help enhance and strengthen our position in this ever-changing market.
“As Volleyball World has become the main global destination hub for volleyball fans, it’s our aim to continuously provide innovative products, technologies and engaging stories that will truly reflect our commitment to the sport of volleyball. We look forward to a successful future together.”
BOXXER, the UK’s next-generation boxing promotion, is pleased to announce the signing of a new media rights partnership with media conglomerate MBC GROUP, to bring LIVE BOXXER programming to 25 territories across the Middle East and North Africa.
MBC GROUP is the largest and leading media company in the MENA region and the partnership will see BOXXER events air LIVE and exclusively to subscribers of MBC’s premium SVOD service Shahid VIP, the world’s leading Arabic streaming platform.
Alongside LIVE event broadcasts, the deal also includes pre- and post-event coverage and a range of shoulder programming, giving millions of viewers in MENA a new level of access to top-tier international boxing while enabling the new generation of elite British boxers to showcase their skills to a region with a rapidly-growing combat sports fanbase.
BOXXER shows air LIVE and exclusively on Sky Sports in the UK and Ireland, after the leading UK sports broadcaster signed BOXXER as its exclusive British provider of boxing content in a landmark four-year deal in 2021.
BOXXER is home to a world-class stable of fighters which includes world champions and Olympic gold medallists, along with the unique BOXXER Series tournament events which bring together Britain’s brightest prospects for one-night, eight-man tournaments.
Commenting on the partnership, BOXXER’s founder and CEO Ben Shalom said: “We’re delighted to announce this partnership with MBC GROUP and bring our events and fighters to viewers throughout the Middle East and North Africa. Our international growth is very exciting and the innovative Shahid VIP platform is the perfect home for BOXXER in the region.”
Tareq Al Ibrahim, Director of Content, Shahid VIP: “We’re thrilled to become the home for BOXXER in the MENA region. This partnership is the latest as part of our mission to bring more premium and exclusive sports content and offerings to Shahid VIP’s ever-growing catalogue.
BOXXER is a recognisable brand that offers top-tier boxing that we look forward to showcasing to our audiences, plus introducing the sport to future generations as well.”
BOXXER’s next event takes place on July 30 in Bournemouth, headlined by Chris Billam-Smith vs Isaac Chamberlain in a highly-competitive cruiserweight clash for the European and Commonwealth championship, which will see the winner firmly within shot of a world title.
The lifting of the restrictions reflect the monumental growth and momentum the league has built in the previous 12 months, following on from the landmark £7m deal with Miami based alternate investment firm 777 partners. This has led to increased attendances across all teams competing in the BBL Championship, as well as the showpiece events across all competitions.
This exciting decision, which was overwhelmingly backed by the league’s clubs, is the next step to the British Basketball League achieving its goal of becoming a top level European league, with its clubs regularly competing in top level competition.
The league are delighted to see both the Leicester Riders and London Lions competing in European competition this season. Ensuring the league’s clubs are competing in Europe on a regular basis provides significant benefits to all of our clubs, as well as playing an instrumental part in the continued accelerated growth of the league off the court. By raising the profile of the league, it allows the BBL to look to attract the very best talent from across the continent, including top GB players to the league. This in turn improves the reputation of the sport from an on court perspective, as well as a commercial perspective which is key to taking the league to the next level on its exciting journey.
Homegrown and British talent is fundamental to the league’s growth and removing the Teams Payment Cap will increase opportunities for homegrown talent to make their mark in the BBL as opposed to moving further afield. This decision also highlights the league’s commitment to providing the most entertaining product for its most important stakeholders, the fans.
British Basketball League, Chairman, Sir Rodney Walker, said: “The league is pleased to be able to make this important change and we believe it highlights the continued growth of the BBL both domestically and on the European stage. We want to be able to continue to attract some of the most skilled and entertaining players to our league and we feel this is a significant step for the continued momentum we have built in the last twelve months.
“It is essential the league continues to grow and put on the best possible spectacle for the fans who come out each week. Finally we believe that if the BBL can nurture the very best British talent we can continue to achieve great success on and off the court in the years ahead.”
Fans can keep up to date with the latest news from across the BBL via bbl.org.uk and the league’s various social media channels.
In this Digital Cafe, David Granger takes a look at where tech and sport are heading over the next few months as fans get more and more say in how they spectate which is good for them and for business.
Not so very long ago personalisation meant you could choose your season ticket seat for home games. Times and technology have moved on and much of the innovation in sport gives fans an ability to make the experience, be it live or on screen, their own.
Proof? Many of the entries – and winners – of the 2022 Sports Technology Awards focused on personalisation of the fan experience – either using.
From the entries to those awards are some of the tech and strategies we’ll be seeing used more and more of in the coming months.
Using an app to boost interaction
The proliferation of sport online has meant a proliferation of potential losses for clubs and federations. Illegal streaming, illegal clipping of content, re-posting of images… is a loss of both revenue and quality control for rights-holders.
One way to combat this is to create your own social channel, which is what the Bleachr app does. By owning the means of publishing, you are able to stop some of the loss of data, engagement, dollars, and fans to social media.
The app builds engagement for spectators and clubs allowing the latter to build fandom, monetize that audience, integrate sponsors, and capture data through gamification.
The app becomes a federation or team’s own social media channel to engage their fanbase remotely, generate revenues, and capture data volunteered by fans. The beauty is it can be used by any content creator with a mobile device, to generate revenue as they build fan interaction.
Bleachr integrates the appeal of live sport with interaction. Its latest iteration introduces elements such as betting, NFTs and gamification so the appeal gets deeper as well as broader for both fans and federations.
Apparently, your average Bundesliga fan has three or four favourite teams (four times the possible heartache, four times the potential elation). This stat is one of the drivers behind their interactive feed. You can choose which matches being played simultaneously you follow on their new app.
You can see highlights whenever they want, get notifications, check live stats and line-ups – all without leaving the main screen. The interaction also gets personalised with localised graphics in various languages, multi-audio support, voting tools, editorial such as pre-match studios and commercial ads/banners.
The app is device agnostic, so available to anyone and it takes personalisation in both spectating and interaction to another level. For all of the four games and teams you might be supporting at one time.
Makes apps work harder
As cricket formats evolve, The Hundred has worked with sports marketing and fan experience specialists InCrowd, utilising technology to put a new spin on things for existing fans and attract new ones. What sets it apart is it provides game information and assists spectators with the live experience by purchasing tickets via their app.
The aim was to engage new fans as well as retain existing cricket fans and does it through, once again, personalisation, gamification and activation. What this means is there are polls to vote in, there’s some neat AR interaction, full results as well as purchasing and sharing tickets via the app.
And what this also does will provide the ECB (English Cricket Board) with some valuable data on the app users and their audiences.
The combination of information, entertainment, ticketing and Covid declarations mean The Hundred app is a superior offering. Add in the promotion of the women’s and girls’ game and the thought which has gone into the target audience needs and the requirement to launch a new tournament make this a valuable tool to fans, federation and the finance department.
Using artificial intelligence to create instant replays
WSC Sports’ AI tech is clever stuff. In real-time during live games or matches it can identify moments and events and publish them as short-format video.
It means rights-holders and federations can extract maximum content from an event, create potential new revenue streams and give a personalised experience for fans on every platform. In collaboration with Google, WSC has automated content creation to cut, crop and add graphics to highlights, for rights-holders to use across their various digital platforms.
It’s already used by ESPN, DAZN, YouTube as well as the NBA, NASCAR and MLS to capture and publish live clips in real time.
Which of these were winners? Check out The Sports Technology Awards website for details on the 2022 contenders and winners and how you can get involved next year
Warner Bros. Discovery Sports (WBDS) has announced a record first half of the year. They have had double-digit audience and engagement growth on all its channels and platforms so far in 2022.
In marked contrast to recent industry trends and expectations, WBDS is witnessing increases on both its linear television channels and digital platforms.
Alongside an enhanced discovery+ user experience and refreshed look for its Eurosport channels, the growth in audience and engagement has been driven by a blockbuster line-up of live sport across the first half of the year. This includes Olympic Winter Games Beijing 2022, the year’s first two tennis Grand Slams, the road cycling season featuring the first Grand Tour of the year, the Giro d’Italia, and a range of new rights for 2022.
In Europe and international markets*, linear television audiences have increased 10% year-on-year (vs H1 2021) across Eurosport and Warner Bros. Discovery’s free-to-air networks in Europe that present live sport. This growth is particularly notable when set against a 11% decline in total television consumption across the industry so far this year. Television audiences on Eurosport channels and sport on free-to-air are up in all major markets including France (+23%), Italy (+19%), Poland (+18%), Spain (+46%) and the U.K. (+12%). Sports coverage on the channels, including Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2, are also attracting more of the available viewers with an average 12% rise in audience share.
discovery+ has led the way in more people streaming live sport and on-demand shoulder content. Unique streaming viewers have increased almost a quarter (+24% vs 2021) across all services, including the Eurosport App, during the first half of the year, while almost half as many more video views (+49%) were added versus the same period in 2021. Sport on discovery+ alone has seen a significant uplift (+50%) compared to the first half of last year, as video views more than doubled (+149%) and streaming minutes more than tripled (+213%).
Andrew Georgiou, President & Managing Director, Warner Bros. Discovery Sports Europe, said: “The significant growth in audience and engagement we’ve seen this year is a testament to our strategy of making content available in whatever way viewers choose to watch. Throughout Europe we are unique in how we are able to engage audiences across our free-to-air, pay TV and streaming platforms – serving all audience segments, from diehard to more casual fans and ‘big eventers’. In this way, we’ve continued to grow our television audiences whilst also seeing a rapid rise in people streaming live sport on discovery+ and our digital services.”
Eurosport’s websites featuring the latest news, results and video content have also seen significant increases in audience numbers so far this year. Eurosport.com and its local websites across Europe have seen a 30% rise in unique monthly visitors, reaching more than 67 million earlier this year**. More people are consuming more content with free video views nearly doubling (+96%) and substantially more minutes being watched (+82%). This was supported across discovery+ Sport and Eurosport social accounts which have seen a significant increase in reach (+100%) and more than doubled the number of user interactions (+151%) and video views (+142%).
In addition, new rights launching in 2022 have seen new viewers attracted to discovery+ and Eurosport. Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) has been particularly popular with UFC and Cage Warriors both engaging new fans for the company’s channels and platforms in Netherlands and Spain. Building on Discovery Sports Events’ role as the global promoter for the sport, the addition of Speedway GP to discovery+ and Eurosport throughout Eurosport has seen a significant jump in viewers streaming the sport.
