The Billie Jean King Cup has a brand new part-owner: Billie Jean King herself.
The International Tennis Federation and TWG Global, a holding firm led by Los Angeles Dodgers principal proprietor Mark Walter, signed a partnership settlement Thursday for a three way partnership to market and promote the ladies’s tennis competitors that was known as the Fed Cup and was re-named to honor King in 2020.
The new entity shall be known as Billie Jean King Cup Limited, with the ITF holding 51% and TWG Global 49%, and it’ll search new sponsorships and broadcast and industrial partnerships.
“We don’t think enough people know what the Billie Jean King Cup is. It is still the largest women’s global team competition,” mentioned Ilana Kloss, a former skilled tennis participant and King’s spouse, who will chair the board of administrators for the enterprise. “We think it’s very important to have a team focused daily on building the Billie Jean King Cup, and investing in the brand.”
This 12 months’s Billie Jean King Cup Finals shall be held in Seville, Spain, on Nov. 7-12.
For the second 12 months in a row, the champions will obtain the identical prize cash because the winners of the lads’s Davis Cup.
“We’ve made a commitment to be bigger, better and bolder. And this is just kind of following on with that,” mentioned David Haggerty, the president of the ITF.
The intention, Haggerty mentioned, is “to really make sure that we make this a sustainable model that we grow, to give women the same opportunities that men have, as well,” together with as gamers, coaches and nationwide federation officers in tennis.
“It really is a true partnership. I mean, obviously, the ITF have incredible expertise in running events, knowing the rules, working with the nations – all of the things that are critical to the competition,” Kloss mentioned. “Our hope is that we can bring some expertise and more focus on a daily basis on the selling of the sponsorship, media rights, getting the word out. I guess no marriage is perfect, but this one is pretty darn good.”
Neither Haggerty nor Kloss, who each spoke to The Associated Press in a video name Thursday, would disclose the sum of money being invested by Walter’s holding firm. Kloss known as it “significant and substantial.”
King and Walter have been enterprise companions up to now, together with within the Dodgers possession and a brand new ladies’s skilled hockey league launching in January.
Kloss, who received Grand Slam titles in ladies’s doubles and blended doubles in 1976 and is the previous chief govt officer of World StaffTennis, mentioned King has “always been about making it better for others.”
“Tennis was an incredible gift for her, right? So for her, it’s more about how can she use her influence and platform to make the competition better for everybody else,” Kloss mentioned. “I don’t think there’s any greater legacy that will be more important to Billie Jean. And I know she gets embarrassed sometimes when we say her name, but you know, there’s no better brand, I believe for us to be affiliated with on a global basis.”
Haggerty, who’s working for re-election this 12 months, mentioned the competitors format will stay the identical for now, however there’s the potential of increasing the variety of groups within the finals.
Currently, 12 nations attain the finals within the Billie Jean King Cup; 16 do within the Davis Cup.
Content Source: www.washingtontimes.com