The Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund (PIF) is near agreeing a deal to sponsor the Giro d’Italia race chief’s pink jersey, as races and groups proceed to look to the Middle East for funding.
Italian web site Tuttobiciweb reported PIF’s curiosity on Saturday, three months after preliminary experiences emerged in Italy about curiosity from PIF to purchase the Giro d’Italia and the Turin soccer staff, each owned by RCS Media Group proprietor Urbano Cairo.
The thought of Cairo promoting his sport pursuits was rapidly denied by the Italian firm however Cyclingnews understands {that a} deal to sponsor the race chief’s pink jersey is near completion.
The PIF emblem or one other model from their huge porfolio of firms might enchantment on the long-lasting pink jersey in May, because the Grand Tour will happen from May 9 to June 1 with a Grande Partenza in Albania. A date for the presentation of the new-look maglia rosa has apparently been pencilled in for the week between the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix.
RCS Sport most well-liked to not remark when contacted by Cyclingnews. However, RCS Sport are apparently trying to find a key sponsor for the pink jersey after Italian vitality model ENEL opted to not prolong their sponsorship of the maglia rosa.
According to Italian enterprise experiences from 2023, the Giro d’Italia jersey sponsors pay at the least 4 million Euro, with the Italian Grand Tour producing greater than 60 million Euro in annual income and near eight million Euro of revenue.
Cyclingnews was informed by one supply that RCS Sport approached PIF greater than 18 months in the past and have additionally had talks with PIF firm SURJ Sports Investments, which specialises in sports activities investments and will make investments $270 million within the One Cycling challenge.
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Depending who you hearken to within the sport, the One Cycling challenge might lastly be signed and introduced inside weeks, whereas others say it’s in chaos and unlikely to occur with out the approval of UCI President David Lappartient.
The Italian authorities lead by by right-wing Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni just lately signed a memorandum of understanding with PIF to spice up cooperation between Italian firms within the non-public sector and PIF and its portfolio firms and the sponsorship of the maglia rosa would assist promote that funding.
The Saudi Public Investment Fund is without doubt one of the largest sovereign wealth funds on this planet with whole estimated property of US$930 billion, however has typically been accused of sportwashing.
The PIF sports activities portfolio already consists of LIV Golf, Premier League soccer membership Newcastle United, investments in skilled boxing and main sponsorship of males’s and ladies’s tennis and Formula 1. PIF just lately took a stake in DAZN, the worldwide loss-making sports activities streaming platform. Saudi Arabia received the race to host the 2034 males’s soccer World Cup and can broadcast the first-ever FIFA Club World Cup this summer time.
Sports is a part of the Saudi Arabian authorities’s Vision 2030 diversification plan because the gulf nation strikes away from conventional oil revenues. Critics have referred to as the technique a type of sports activities washing as Saudi Arabia seems to gloss over its human rights file.