Sony Ericsson sponsors WTA tour in £47m tie-up

by Mark Sweney, Marketing 12-Jan-05

Sony Ericsson has struck an $88m (£46.6m) deal to sponsor the WTA women's professional tennis tour.

The six-year tie-up is the mobile handset company's first global sponsorship and the biggest in the history of tennis and women's sport.

The deal coincides with a rise of almost 20% in Sony Ericsson's global advertising budget as it seeks to take a slice of market leader Nokia's 30% share. In the UK, this would take its adspend to about £10m.

Sony Ericsson, launched in 2001, has 7% of the world handset market. It plans to use the sponsorship to give it a global brand presence, and as a platform to show off its technology.

Plans for the sponsorship, negotiated in conjunction with MEC:Sponsorship, a division of Mediaedge:cia, include the development of a mobile phone tennis game and limited-edition WTA-branded phones.

Sony Ericsson will have access to some of the world's best players, including Venus and Serena Williams, but not Wimbledon champion Maria Sharapova, as she has a deal with rival Motorola.

Dee Dutta, the mobile firm's corporate vice-president of global marketing, said that traditional advertising was not the sole way of building a global footprint. Instead, the company wanted to use the sponsorship deal to 'make wireless come alive'.

In September Marketing revealed that Sony Ericsson had struck a deal to sponsor US pop star Anastacia's European tour to promote its F500i camera phone (Marketing, 2 September).