Prior to the summer of 2023, Manchester United had experienced a decade of turmoil.
The Reds have not won the Premier League title since Sir Alex Ferguson's retirement in 2013, reaching the quarter-finals of the Champions League only twice in that decade, and becoming their fifth manager with Erik ten Hag. The club appears to be on the verge of selling their historic Old Trafford stadium naming rights and the Carrington training facility both need to undergo the necessary modernisation.
Against this backdrop, Manchester United entered the market in search of a new shirt chest sponsor.
Germany-based software company TeamViewer announced in 2022 that it did not intend to renew its five-year deal with Manchester United, which is worth $47 million per year (£37 million at current exchange rates), and that the deal only began in 2021. By December 2022, Manchester United and TeamViewer had reached an agreement that would allow clubs to buy back the rights to sponsor their shirt chests.
The search mission sent Manchester United's league and partnerships chief executive, Victoria Timpson, to San Diego, California, where she made a request to Qualcomm's chief marketing officer (CMO), Don McGuire. Qualcomm is an American technology company and an existing partner of Manchester United. She asked Qualcomm if they would like to be the sponsor of the new jersey chest. After months of negotiations, the two sides reached an agreement: a three-year contract worth $225 million.
Manchester United today unveiled their new home kit, with the most prominent sponsor being Qualcomm's subsidiary Snapdragon, which will be worn by the club's men's and women's teams during matches. If you're curious about what Snapdragon does, the chips or processors it produces are found in about three billion devices worldwide, including smartphones, PCs, virtual reality devices, game consoles, and cars.
In an interview, CMO McGuire revealed:
l Snapdragon reserves the right to extend the agreement for a further two years on top of the initial three-year agreement.
The $75 million annual sponsorship fee is not conditional on Manchester United's qualification to the Champions League, and there will be no penalty even if the Reds fail to qualify for Europe's top clubs for several seasons in a row.
l Snapdragon reserves the right to place the name of a charity on the front chest of the Manchester United shirt during one match per season to promote charity.
l Snapdragon's chief marketing officer said it would be a smart and positive move for the Premier League to schedule a single regular season game for Manchester United in a key market outside the UK, such as the US.
l Snapdragon wants to invite Manchester United Women to play tours in the United States, including a possible friendly against the NWSL's San Diego Waves at Snapdragon Stadium in California.
In his San Diego office, McGuire explained why Snapdragon believes Manchester United, despite its shortcomings in recent years, remains an attractive sponsorship. The company also sponsors the Mercedes F1 team and has the help of the CAA sports agency to carry out an analysis of leagues and teams across a number of sports, along with a closer look at cricket.
"Football is clearly the biggest sport in the world," McGuire said. "This provides huge coverage and the top football is the Premier League.
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'We could have chosen to make a deal with the Premier League as a whole. We could have chosen to work with F1 only and not at team level. But fundamentally, it's the team that is the source of passion. People love their team, they love the racers, they love the players. They don't necessarily care about the league itself. Leagues exist only to set rules and organize events. Therefore, we chose Manchester United for several reasons. One of them is size: Manchester United has more than 1.1 billion supporters worldwide. ”
Manchester United have long used the figure of "1.1 billion", including when pitching to investors including petrochemical company INEOS and Qatar's Jassim. The strategic review culminated in the purchase of a 25% stake in the club by Sir Jim Ratcliffe, the head of INEOS, and control of the club's football and commercial operations. Does McGuire really believe Manchester United has 1.1 billion fans? If so, then how are fans defined in this case?
"You look at jersey sales all over the world," he said. "They sell more than anyone else. You look at engagement on social media. We've broken it down by country; China has 253 million. China is their biggest fan base, and it's a very important market for me. India is their second-largest fan base, and then the United States is the third.
"It's about the global market impact of the brand and the franchise, especially the market I care about, because Snapdragon is a global brand. So I need to think about things outside of England, outside of Manchester City and Manchester United competition. It's good drama, good material and a story behind it. But I'm thinking about the big picture. I'm thinking globally. What gives me the best return on my investment? That's why we chose Manchester United. "
McGuire admits that he needs to do some convincing work within Qualcomm about the financial commitment to the deal.
"It's kind of like pushing a boulder up a hill because we've never done anything on this scale before," he said. "The broadcast exposure of a game as a sponsor of the front chest of Manchester United's jersey could be the equivalent of a Super Bowl advertisement. So imagine having more than 40 games a year. You can give me hundreds of millions of dollars to advertise around the world, or we can do it in a more cost-effective way. ’”
The deal will be one of the final confirmed deals among Timpson in a series of Manchester United executives who have left Old Trafford following his investment in INEOS. She will leave in three months' time, following the departure of the club's former CEO Richard Arnold, interim CEO Patrick Stewart, CFO Cliff Barty, chief communications and marketing executive Ellie Norman, and football director Mottaugh.
One of Timpson's roles in securing the deal was to ensure that the turmoil at the club would not have an impact on United's commercial activities. Her team managed to avoid any punitive clauses that would have arisen if United had failed to qualify for the Champions League. Manchester United's shirt contract with Adidas, for example, contains a clause that will be reduced if the club fails to play in the tournament for consecutive seasons.
"Integrity is very important to us," McGuire added. "There are many ways to win. You can win on the pitch. We want to be with the winners...... We know Manchester United are taking the right steps to realign football operations and take them to a different position. We are confident in this long-term plan. ”
Last week, British media revealed that Manchester United were considering selling the naming rights to the refurbished Old Trafford or the new stadium. The interview came ahead of that report, but McGuire was asked if he would consider taking a similar approach with Manchester United, given that Snapdragon is already sponsoring a stadium in San Diego. McGuire explained that Snapdragon was already helping to improve Wi-Fi at Old Trafford and Carrington, where he said connectivity had been "terrible" because Carrington was located in the countryside southwest of Manchester.
"If we want to work further together, it's really going to depend on the results we see," McGuire said when asked about naming rights. "Do we believe we can get more value out of it? Because there is a law of diminishing returns in everything. ”
"I'll give you a perfect example. We have extended our partnership with Mercedes F1 to include the F1 Academy. We felt it made sense to support the mission of the F1 Academy, whose ultimate goal is to produce the first female F1 driver. So we expanded and revolved our brand around Doriane Pin, a 20-year-old young Mercedes driver who currently sits second in the F1 academy, and we thought it would be good for the brand. ”
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'If we think there is a chance to go beyond shirt advertising with Manchester United, and if we believe there is more to nurture and gain from this relationship, we will certainly continue to consider that possibility.'
There may be an opportunity for discussion during Manchester United's upcoming pre-season tour, when they take on Real Betis at the Snapdragon Stadium in San Diego on 31 July. Manchester United also played Wrexham at the same stadium last summer. Manchester United's popularity in the United States was reflected in their friendly match against Liverpool in South Carolina on August 3, which sold out in 15 minutes in a stadium with a capacity of 77,000 spectators.
FIFA, the governing body for international football, is currently reviewing its policy that may allow competitive regular matches to be played outside of the home country. This prompted executives at NBC (which broadcasts the Premier League in the United States) and CBS (CBS, which broadcasts the UEFA Champions League) to support the idea of holding a one-off game in the United States.
As Manchester United's shirt front partner, does this mean Snapdragon will get more positive exposure?
"Of course," McGuire said. "Following the model of the National Football League (NFL) and Major League Baseball (MLB), where they go abroad and play regular season games, these games count towards their win-loss record. For the Premier League and European football as a whole, it makes perfect sense to consider this approach. ”
Manchester United take on Wrexham at the Snapdragon Stadium in July 2023
"It's great for me given the wide reach of global football and the fact that our brand is reflected in every corner of the world. We've just secured our latest Major League Soccer (MLS) franchise in San Diego and they'll be playing at Snapdragon Stadium (starting the 2025 season earlier next year), so we're very happy about that. With David Beckham's investment in Inter Miami and the arrival of Lionel Messi, as well as the 2026 World Cup in Mexico, the United States and Canada, we have so much momentum. There is also women's soccer, as well as the level of the U.S. National Team and the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL); The San Diego Waves are also playing at Snapdragon Sports. ”
"Taking that momentum and taking advantage of it and then deciding 'let's schedule some actual regular events in these other locations', I think it's good for the league, whether it's the Premier League or European football as a whole. I think it's amazing. It's nothing more than about the expansion of the audience base, right? So I think that's very good. ”
Manchester United's women's teams have never played a friendly in the United States yet, but their Women's Premier League rivals Arsenal and Chelsea will travel to the United States this summer to play the Washington Spirit and Gotham of the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL).
McGuire laughed: "We'd really like to see Manchester United Women play San Diego Waves at Snapdragon Stadium. That would be fantastic. We've actually talked about this already. So we very much hope that this will happen. I think the Waves are also very willing to do that. So to this question, my answer is: yes, yes, yes, yes. ”