Attempting to "establish as much credibility in North America as it has overseas," media rights agency MP & Silva brought on sports industry veteran Chris Lencheski to head global sponsorship sales, according to Terry Lefton of the SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL. Lencheski has been a senior adviser to MP & Silva's management and board of directors since '15. Lencheski said, "We want to grow this [sponsorship] silo to match the size of the media business. And by bringing a real focus to the U.S., where we're building, and looking at the large opportunities overseas, where we have an established media rights business, I think we can do that." He added that MP & Silva's sponsorship revenue represents less than 10% of the company's overall revenue. Lencheski will be based in N.Y. and manage the company's global sponsorship sales team. He has "more than 24 years of sports industry experience." Until June, he was vice chair and CEO of IRG Sports & Entertainment, which owns and runs the Int'l Hot Rod Association. Lencheski's hiring is the "latest in what has been an eventful, if not tumultuous, period for MP & Silva." Last May, Chinese brokerage firm Everbright Securities and digital entertainment company Baofeng Technology combined for a billion-dollar purchase of 65% of the agency. In the U.S. since last year, MP & Silva has hired Frank Uddo from WWE as North American president; lost Dan Cohen, managing partner/SVP for the Americas, to Octagon, which is launching a media consulting business; hired Jesse Ryback as VP of sponsorship and then lost him to WME-IMG; and made an "aggressive run" at Major League Soccer rights, "offering to quadruple that league's current media rights deal" in exchange for installing the type of promotion/relegation system common in Europe. MLS flatly rejected the offer earlier this summer (SPORTSBUSINESS JOURNAL, 8/28 issue).
