Industry Shorts: British Wheelchair Basketball, Eurosport, Jaguar Racing

British Wheelchair Basketball (BWB) have announced new partnerships with four organisations as it looks to deliver its new initiative, Inspire a Generation, which aims to double participation in the sport.

The NGB has partnered with StreetGames, WheelPower, Whizz Kidz and UK Coaching, who will assist with the recruitment of Community Activators, who will deliver the Inspire a Generation wheelchair basketball taster sessions in communities across England. BWB also says it is actively seeking Local and National Delivery Partners to support the development of the initiative.

Inspire a Generation will roll out in the summer when restrictions relax, and aims to double participation in the sport over four years. The campaign will be backed by £1.5 million of funding from Sport England will also seek to address the inequalities that people with disabilities have faced compared with non-disabled people in accessing sport and physical activity during the coronavirus pandemic.

Eurosport has released figures for the first week of its Australian Open coverage, which it says has created a double-digit uplift in views across its linear channels, as well as triple-digit increases to its websites.

Fans visiting local Eurosport websites have driven huge increases in unique visitors compared with 2020 in Germany (+158%), Italy (+137%) and the UK (+223%). The broadcaster attributes this to fans catching up with news from the tournament, as well as the opinions of its pundits and the ‘best in class’ digital storytelling content hosted on the sites.

The Discovery-owned network has also reported an uplift in views on both its Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2 linear channels, which have seen 41% and 28% increases respectively.

Jaguar Racing announced a new partnership with UK-based software provider, Micro Focus, ahead of the start of the seventh edition of the ABB FIA Formula E World Championship.

Micro Focus will become the team’s Official Digital Transformation, Business Resiliency and Analytics partner, initially to provide technology from its product group, Vertica, which will deliver high-performance advanced analytics and machine learning for the team on the track.

The software company will also conduct a cyber resilience assessment workshop to help the team identify any potential risks and gaps in their cyber security posture, and it plans to deliver tools and support to help accelerate the team’s software development. 

Sustainability-focused Formula E team Envision Virgin Racing has announced a new partnership with the WaterBear Network, a new interactive on-demand platform dedicated to highlighting climate change issues.

The collaboration will see the carbon neutral motorsport team become the exclusive Formula E team content partner of WaterBear, which has already partnered with more than 80 charities, NGOs and sports properties around the world including Extreme E, WWF and Greenpeace.

To kickstart the partnership, WaterBear will stream the team’s new multi-part sustainability series presented by eco-activists Amy and Ella Meek, otherwise known as Kids Against Plastic. WaterBear members will also be able to watch and engage with all the team’s campaigns and original content from its ‘Race Against Climate Change’ initiative via a bespoke ‘branded environment’ on the channel.

Formula 1 has announced Getty Images as its Official Photographic Agency, covering every F1, F2, F3 and Porsche Super Cup race.

The new long-term partnership formalises the professional relationship between the pair which has taken in decades of competition. Getty Images’ specialist motorsport photographers have covered the sport for years, with the new agreement ensuring that continues. 

UK Pro League Tennis, and tournament operators River Media, have appointed PTI Digital ahead of its second season, to build a scalable digital-led strategy to support their commercial goals, with the ambition of significant growth for the domestic tournament.

PTI’s remit will include advisory work to broaden the appeal of the event and grow the addressable audience, build digital and data layers to deliver commercial growth and revenue for the tournament, engage key audiences and bring the best of British players to tennis fans around the country.

Cycling’s Women’s Tour has been postponed due to coronavirus, and rescheduled for later in the year in the hope of having fans in attendance.

Organiser SweetSpot has moved the event from its original June slot and has instead requested alternate race dates of Monday 4th to Saturday 9th October from the UCI.