Miles’ priority: Land new TV contract
Speculation surrounds title sponsor
While speculaI NDIANAPOLIS tion centers on whether Verizon will return as the IndyCar Series’ title sponsor when its contract expires after the 2018 season, IndyCar CEO Mark Miles’ primary concern now is securing the circuit’s television future.
“So far (with Verizon), it’s we’ll see,” Miles said, noting that talks will begin soon, during an interview with The Indianapolis Star on Wednesday. “I believe any major sponsorship decision, when you have the luxury of being able to do it, is best made when integrated into the media discussions.”
Once a TV deal is completed, Miles can present Verizon — and any other potential title sponsor — with an enhanced understanding of the benefits of doing business with IndyCar.
“It’s not beyond the pale to think that we might be able to in- tegrate sponsorship with television,” Miles said. “And that conversation is further along. ... Maybe by (September), we’ll see if we have something to say or not.”
Many of the reports of Verizon’s rumored departure center around a change in senior leadership.
Former Verizon Wireless CEO Dan Mead, who helped broker the deal with IndyCar in 2014, was believed to be a big fan of racing. But his departure, Miles said, doesn’t necessarily mean the end of Verizon’s relationship with IndyCar.
“No one makes decisions like this because they happen to like a sport,” Miles said, with a laugh. “Though it doesn’t hurt.”
Verizon has been a “fantastic title sponsor” that has delivered everything it said it would, according to Miles. “They’re standup people, professionals with resources. And the view and feedback I’ve gotten is we’ve been the same.”
The company’s new senior leaders are using this season to “get a sense of what we do, what IndyCar is about and what they value they get at various tracks,” Miles said.
In the meantime, IndyCar is preparing for the possibility of finding a new title sponsor. Miles plans to have a good handle on IndyCar’s value in the marketplace, but he also has other ideas for title sponsorship.
One that he finds particularly interesting is selling title sponsorship to the broadcaster that lands the series’ TV rights.
This type of deal is not common, Miles said, but he helped negotiate a similar deal as the CEO of the ATP World Tour between European sports network Eurosport and the ATP.
The deal is attractive to sponsors because their advertisements can be integrated more fully into the event.
Broadcasters could offer multifaceted advertising packages to sponsors that could include title sponsorship, commercials and signage around the track.
The negotiation process remains ongoing. Miles’ goal is to strike a domestic TV deal with one provider rather than continuing to oscillate between networks as the series has this season on NBC Sports Network and ABC.
“As long as we can get the cov- erage we want, in an ideal setting, one partner is best,” Miles said. “But if one partner said, ‘Well, you’re on the third tier of our platform half the time,’ and we could go to two (partners) and be better exposed, then that has to be taken into account.”
In considering prospective TV partners, Miles is looking well beyond the traditional players.
There is an emerging digital market for live sports that IndyCar, as well as other major sports leagues, have to consider.
“We’re approaching a pivot point in the marketplace related to how people watch live sports,” he said. “There is an emergence of (non-traditional) big, legitimate players that wants sports.”
Amazon, for example, recently secured the rights to live stream the NFL’s Thursday Night Football game.
Amazon, though, cannot offer predictions about what its audiences will be because it’s so new to the game.
That makes it tough for a series such as IndyCar to know whether going to Amazon would be a viable option.
“It’s the Wild, Wild West out there with the emergence of these new, big players,” Miles said. “But they’re well resourced and they’re absolutely serious.”