Sochi 2014 Launches Sponsorship Program

Sochi 2014 organizers announce they will offer top tier sponsorships in six categories. (Sochi 2014)Organizers of the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics launch their top tier domestic sponsor categories.

The six categories unveiled today include metallurgy, oil, gas, banking services, telecommunication services, sportswear and apparel. There are plans to add another two categories.

Dmitry Chernyshenko, president and CEO of Sochi 2014, last month revealed to ATR that the first domestic sponsor was unlikely to be a banking partner due to the global financial crisis.

Sochi's first sponsor is expected to fill the oil or telecommunications slot.

Russian companies have one month to submit their expressions of interest to the Olympic organizing committee after invitations to tender were sent out to industry leaders in each of the categories.

Igor Stolyarov, Sochi 2014's vice president of marketing, communications and commercial operations, gave details about each category to delegates attending a roundtable event called “Sports competitions as marketing instruments” in Moscow today.

“A partnership with the Sochi 2014 organizing committee will provide unprecedented opportunities for our strategic partners and will help to realize their most ambitious plans and projects,” said Chernyshenko

“We are not just choosing commercial partners – we are choosing allies.”

Sochi's marketing program in Russia covers several levels: Sochi 2014 'general partners' (up to eight companies); second tier or 'official partners' (up to 10 companies); up to 15 suppliers will fill third tier slots and be designated 'Sochi 2014 partners.'

Last week, Dmitry Kozak, Russia's deputy prime minister for the Sochi Olympics, insisted the country was in a strong position to ride out the economic downturn and its knock-on effects on Games preparations.

“We have enough reserves accumulated thanks to the optimal economic policy that was pursued in recent years. Thanks to a positive situation on the world market, including that of fuel and energy, we didn’t eat up those surpluses,” he told Russia Today.

“We have a very solid safety buffer to cope with the crisis, even if it’s going to be mid-term. Therefore, we are ready to fulfill all the commitments that we’ve undertaken.”

He communicated similar reassurances to the IOC in a teleconference last Wednesday when he updated the executive board on Sochi's progress.

But on Monday Kozak confirmed that Sochi 2014 was returning $720 million to the government as loans to help combat the country's financial crisis. At least half of the unallocated funds given to the Olympstroy state corporation, the body responsible for Olympic venues and infrastructure, are going back into government coffers.

“Olympstroy will be ready to allocate these funds in the near future,” Kozak told the Interfax news agency.

Sochi is spending around $13 billion to develop the Black Sea resort and Krasnodar region for the Olympics; the majority of venues and infrastructure are being built from scratch. A total of 247 projects are slated for completion in time for the Games. All Olympic venues are expected to be under construction by the end of 2009.

Also this week, Kozak was forced to dismiss media reports claiming the government was considering replacing Olympstroy head Viktor Kolodyazhny and Krasnodar Governor Alexander Tkachev.

The impact of the credit crunch on Olympic construction work and other aspects of Games preparations will be among issues discussed at a meeting of the Sochi 2014 Supervisory Board in Moscow's White House, home of the Russian Parliament, on Dec. 24.

The body, headed by Alexander Zhukov, is responsible for strategic decisions regarding Sochi's Olympic plans. Kozak and Chernyshenko also sit on the 20-member board.

With reporting from Mark Bisson.

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