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FISU and Olympic Channel sign Memorandum of Understanding

FISU 19 June 2018

FISU and Olympic Channel join forces to showcase university sports coverage

 

LAUSANNE, 19 June 2018 – FISU, the home of international university sport, announced today that it has reached an agreement with the Olympic Channel to collaborate on content. The signing of today’s Memorandum of Understanding strengthens FISU’s position to effectively engage new audiences and younger generations all year round, utilising the Olympic Channel’s digital platform and social channels.

 

Following the announcement, FISU President Oleg Matytsin said:

 

“Our collaboration with the Olympic Channel is another great step forward for FISU. New technology has made it more realistic than ever to produce extensive coverage of FISU’s wide portfolio of high-quality international competitions, featuring the world’s best university sportswomen and men.

 

“From the success of our own digital distribution of coverage for FISU competitions, we know there is a strong appetite for watching student sport and this MoU will become integral to our new TV and digital strategy. FISU is grateful for this opportunity to bring coverage of student sport to even bigger audiences, and to growing awareness of the great student athletes competing all year round.”

 

For 2018, the FISU event calendar includes 34 World University Championships, as well as the FISU Forum, which is an educational symposium focused on supporting dual career athletes. FISU is also showcasing its 3×3 Basketball World University League where, for the first time in FISU history, student-athletes will compete for their university rather than their national teams.

 

In 2019, FISU will also have its showpiece events: the Summer and Winter Universiades. In March, the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk, Russia, will host the Winter Universiade, while the passionate Italian sports city of Napoli will host the summer edition in July. As the largest summer and winter university multi-sport competitions in the world, each event draws several thousand student-athletes together in competition.

 

The Olympic Channel today also announced that it had reached agreements with seven other sport governing bodies and multi-sport organisations to collaborate on content for the Olympic Channel. Alongside FISU, these eight new cooperation agreements bring the number of the global platform’s federation partners to 75.

The Federation of International Lacrosse (FILx), International Federation of Basque Pelota (FIPV), International Korfball Federation (IKF), International Sumo Federation (IFS) and International Wushu Federation (IWUF), in addition to the International Committee of Mediterranean Games (ICMG) and Special Olympics, join FISU in partnering with the Olympic Channel.

 

The full portfolio of the Olympic Channel’s federation partners includes international federations (IFs), IOC-recognised federations and organisations, multi-sport organisers and federations not recognised by the IOC.

 John Palfrey, Director of Stakeholder Relations at Olympic Channel, met with FISU CEO Eric Saintrond to sign the agreement

“The Olympic Channel provides a platform for the promotion of all sports and athletes within the Olympic Movement,” said Mark Parkman, General Manager of the Olympic Channel. “We look forward to working together to help expand the reach of these sports and events through the creation and distribution of content targeting a worldwide audience.”

 

In addition to collaborating on live events, the Olympic Channel actively works with its federation partners to present event coverage, highlights, magazine shows, news coverage and original programming, providing an additional platform to distribute content that is complementary to current broadcast and distribution arrangements.

 

The Olympic Channel is a multi-platform destination where fans can experience the power of sport and the excitement of the Olympic Games all year round, and is available worldwide via mobile apps for Android and iOS devices and at olympicchannel.com.

Top-level sports events like the Napoli 2019 Summer Universiade soon will have a home — and their own dedicated section— on the Olympic Channel