World Table Tennis Announces Four New Partnerships

World Table Tennis has today revealed four new partnerships, aimed at helping to elevate table tennis to the global sports elite.

After the recent unveiling of WTT’s Strategic Partnership with IMG, WTT is proud to announce its collaborations with the following partners:

• 160over90
• Pumpjack Dataworks
• Gemba
• Superunion

“We are delighted to have on board with us a number of first-in-class partners, 160over90, Pumpjack Dataworks, Gemba and Superunion, who, together with IMG, are enabling us to drive table tennis to unprecedented and incredibly exciting heights. All of these partnerships will help us to revolutionise the player and fan experience around our sport, which is at the forefront of everything that World Table Tennis is striving to achieve. Now we have lift-off, we cannot wait to see how our joint journey evolves. The future of table tennis is brighter than ever.” – Matt Pound, Director at WTT

160over90

160over90, part of the Endeavor network alongside IMG, is helping WTT to formulate a global promotion strategy. This strategy will be built by completing detailed analysis of the existing table tennis fanbase around the world, as well as identifying new high-value markets, understanding how to attract new audiences to the revamped WTT events and digital offering.

The detailed market analysis will then inform specific promotional campaigns and the WTT brand experience, helping to develop a unique positioning that is reflective of WTT’s ambition to transform the sport.

“The 160over90 team is already enjoying working on what is a very forward-thinking repositioning of table tennis through WTT. The ability to identify future markets and build out the relevant campaign narratives for target audiences will give WTT a head start to engage in markets and expand their proposition. We are excited to be doing this alongside the role our colleagues from IMG are playing, bringing to bear the strength of the Endeavor network for WTT.” – Robin Clarke, SVP, International at 160over90

Pumpjack Dataworks

PumpJack Dataworks is helping WTT in its mission of enhancing table tennis fan engagement and the value delivered to passionate table tennis fans everywhere. This includes delivering personalised digital content to fans around the world and developing a global fan database to better serve fans based on their location, interests, favourite players and many other elements of their table tennis journey. WTT will provide opportunities for fans to follow every match, team and player, whether they attend live tournaments, tune in from around the globe, or engage with a robust video content offering including the best matches and moments with the global stars of table tennis.

Pumpjack Dataworks will provide two key components in this strategy: a customer data platform and a mobile application platform to provide new capabilities to generate intelligent content delivery, including transactional components: ticketing, merchandise and OTT subscriptions, as well as new capabilities to generate dynamic knowledge of the fanbase to support new opportunities for commercial partners to add value to the fans’ experiences and special offers or ‘money can’t buy’ experiences.

“We are extremely excited to be working with WTT on a project of this scale. The global reach and diversity of the table tennis audience internationally provides incredible opportunities to create bespoke and personalised experiences for fans of this fast-action sport, whether they are at the tournament or viewing at home. This is a classic case for data to support the true value of a sport that has incredible global reach and appeal with passionate fans around the world.” – Nick Goggans, Co-Founder and CEO at PumpJack Dataworks

Gemba

Gemba, a high-end consultancy providing insight and strategy to the global sport and entertainment industry, is supporting WTT with its sponsorship and media rights valuations.

With the remodelling of WTT’s event structure and also partnership structure, WTT needs to have a complete understanding of table tennis’ scale and identity in relation to other key sports in the global market.

Gemba was therefore tasked to independently assess:

• market value of WTT’s commercial partnership rights under the new restructure;
• potential market value of WTT’s broadcast rights;
• insights into WTT’s broadcast rights strategy to maximise strategic and financial outcomes through broadcast.

The commercial partnership valuation was completed using Gemba’s purpose-built valuation platform, Turnstile. Since its launch in 2018, Turnstile has valued sponsorships for the world’s biggest leagues, clubs and events.

“The vision for World Table Tennis is both exciting and highly innovative. The need for robust market sizing and valuations to support its launch phase allowed us to deploy our global capabilities across both our Gemba and Turnstile teams. We are eagerly looking forward to watching the roll out of the concept in 2021.” – Rob Mills, Global CEO, Gemba Group

Superunion

Superunion is providing branding expertise to ensure that WTT benefits from a standout visual identity, which resonates with WTT’s core values and its audience.

The partnership with Superunion has already seen the launch of WTT’s eye-catching new logo, which emphasises how the WTT brand is bringing a new level of professionalism and authority to the sport, inviting the world to look at table tennis from a fresh, modern perspective.