The Stade Vélodrome de Marseille “will be renamed Orange Vélodrome for 10 years, the fruit of a partnership” between Arema, the group that runs Olympique de Marseille’s stadium, and French telecom Orange, according to Thierry Wojciak of CB NEWS. Orange CEO Stéphane Richard said, “This type of partnership is only meaningful in the long term, we can’t change the name of this place every year or every two years.” Neither parties “unveiled the financials of the partnership.” The deal will also see “the deployment of 1,000 WiFi terminals in the stadium with the capacity of 20,000 simultaneous users.” Richard: “The first goal was to keep the ‘Vélodrome’ name. It’s a brand, a very strong identity, and what interests us is to attach these two identities.” A number of French stadiums and sporting venues have “adopted this method of sponsorship.” Bordeaux now has the Matmut Atlantique, Nice: the Allianz Riviera, Le Mans: MMArena and in Paris: the Paliai omnisports de Paris Bercy became the AccorHotels Arena last year (CB NEWS, 6/3). LE PROGRES reported according to a source, the deal is worth €3M ($3.4M) per year for 10 years. The news “probably does not please Olympique Lyonnais, which also solicited Orange” for a naming rights deal for its new stadium. But OL President Jean-Michel Aulas is “still waiting to name his stadium,” hoping for €10M ($11.4M) per year for 15 years (LE PROGRES, 6/3).
