Manchester United launched a two-year partnership with an international drinks company, Diageo, for one (unsure which one) of its brands in Asia Pacific.

The partnership between two parties will be activated with a  “Spirit of Champions” campaign theme later this September. The campaign will be launched in six key Asian markets, which include China, India, Japan, Korea, Thailand and Vietnam. This program will try to reflect the behaviour and determination required, to stay top of the game and simply to be the best. Moreover, it’s also said that Manchester United strongly supported the use of the sponsorship as a platform for responsible drinking.

Well. Responsible drinking is important, especially if you drink one of those Diageo brands. You could feel awesome :D.

Can find this nowhere in both parties’ official site but there are news at Daily Express Malaysia, Yahoo! Malaysia and a Google search result.

I missed this story. Really. It was published at November 28, 2005.

I found this old article from Cnet reporting that after diminished the sponsorship contract with Vodafone the club has started sponsorship talk with some technology giants.

Excerpt from the article:

Manchester United is in talks with a number of global high-tech giants, including Google, about replacing Vodafone as its shirt sponsor, according to reports.

The paper, citing sources in London’s financial center, said the Vodafone brand is not well-known in the U.S. and the termination of the deal gives the Glazer family the opportunity to bag a bigger global brand that will help give Manchester United a higher profile in America.

Two of the nontech brands believed to be in talks with the soccer club are Coca-Cola and Levi Strauss.

Given Google’s high reputation in Open Source communities and it is now the biggest internet company in the world, i was wonder how big ManUtd can be now in terms of the internet presence. And, we, bloggers who blog about The Red Devils must be… um… much more bigger thing than now. Um… maybe.

But i’ll be super glad if Google sponsoring the club.

Image via Wikipedia

Player’s high salaries and the recent controversial ticket price hikes is an `integral’ part of the club’s global success story, David Gill told a gathering of business people at Manchester Business School.

Some highlights of his speech:

1. Business turnover has grown from £80m in 1991 to £245m as of the end of last year.
2. In the same period, the club’s post-tax profits have increased from £6m to £18m.
3. Independent research: United is followed by 330m people globally - giving sponsors access to `unrivalled’ media exposure.
4. The players recognise that they really are pivotal to the club’s success so they can demand high fees.
5. The team creates the flair which perpetuates Red’s media coverage, which in turn reassures our sponsors that they are getting the best possible media exposure around the world
6. The vision is to be the best club both on and off the pitch.
7. 8,000 of Old Trafford’s 76,000 seats are executive class and contribute around 40% of all match day revenue.

Forbes announced that Manchester United is the most valuable soccer team in the world with estimated value around US $1,453 million and also the most profitable football club in the world with a $92 million in operational income (EBIT).

Other team that has the most value change (growth) is Olympic Lyon beating out all other team include Manchester United with a 6% growth from last year.

What i fear is that Manchester United has 84% debt/value ratio beating out Arsenal’s despite The Gunners had spent a lot of money building the new stadium. Is this means that the club’s growth leveraged by a huge amount of debt? If it is, then the management board must be in stress because then they will need a huge profit this year before the closing accounting period to keep the debt ratio ’safe’. From what i know, this is dangerous and had successfully killed many businesses. Ouch, no fun.

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