By David Owen
September 6 – Infront Sports & Media, the Chinese-owned international sports marketing company, has announced a major expansion of its Italian football activities. The company has acquired Gsport, a leader in marketing rights management in Italian club football, as well as Sport09, an Italian sports media agency.
By Mark Baber
September 4 – Chelsea has unveiled Wipro, the Bangalore, India-based multi-national global information technology company, as the club’s new official digital and IT partner. Last week Manchester United announced a similar digital partnership with another Indian technology company, HCL Technologies.
September 4 – The last week has seen another boost in Twitter followers to Premier League clubs with a growth of 210,392 across all clubs compared to 196,493 the week before.
By Samindra Kunti
September 4 – The Brazilian Football Confederation CBF want to open up new markets and have targeted Russia, Iran, Nigeria and Morocco, notwithstanding an institutional crisis at home.
By David Owen
September 2 – As television and the globalised market for players fuel the increasing internationalisation of the fan bases of leading football clubs, digital technology is of growing importance for clubs seeking to communicate with, and generate revenue from, these supporters.
By Mark Baber
September 1 – C&C Group plc, and the Scottish FA have agreed a seven-figure deal for Tennent’s to be the official beer partner of the Scotland National Team for the next three years.
By Paul Nicholson
September 1 – Indonesian telecom operator Indosat has signed official telecom partner deals with three of Europe’s club giants – Arsenal, Barcelona and Inter Milan. The two-year deals will deliver exclusive content, breaking news and video to Indonesian fans.
By Paul Nicholson
August 31 – The Premier League closed off its fourth round of matches going into the first international break of the season having sold a total of more than 1.4 million tickets – a remarkable 95.8% of all tickets available.
By David Owen
August 30 – Dalian Wanda Group, the Chinese conglomerate which this year bought 20% of Atlético Madrid, claims to have become the world’s largest sports operating company after acquiring a US-based triathlon business for $650 million.
By Paul Nicholson
August 28 – Manchester United again top the weekly Insideworldfootball Twitter growth table in a week that saw overall growth across all Premier League club twitter activity, resulting in an overall increase in followers of 0.63% compared to 0.57% the previous week.
By Ben Nicholson
August 28 – Gatorade, a PepsiCo brand, has taken the Official Sports Drink sponsorship category for the UEFA Champions League, as part of the three-year deal signed by parent company PepsiCo last month.
By Tom Parsons
August 27 – A Barcelona-based study has found that Real Madrid and Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo has the strongest social media presence of all athletes in the world.
August 26 – Premier League Liverpool have renewed tyre manufacturer Maxxis for a further two year sponsorship, the second time it has extended its partnership with the club.
By Paul Nicholson
August 26 – Consolidation in the betting market is continuing with Irish bookmaker Paddy Power and betting exchange Betfair set to merge in a multibillion euro creating a combined business of more than €1.5 billion annually.
By Mark Baber
August 26 – Bayer 04 Leverkusen have settled the outstanding case with Teldafax following a recommendation from the Higher Regional Court in Cologne, thereby ending a long-running legal dispute with the insolvency receiver involved with the TelDaFax companies.