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Christoph Handwerk

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Three-pillar partnership: Deutsche Telekom becomes official partner of UEFA EURO 2024™

  • Highspeed: Telekom connects all stadiums, team basecamps, training grounds and the International Broadcast Center 
  • High brand visibility: Telekom becomes national sponsor and presents the flag bearer programme and equips fan zones
  • MagentaTV: All matches live and in top quality
  • Media cooperation with RTL: Joint studio and agreement on redistribution of exclusive matches
left to right: Michael Hagspihl (DTAG), Johannes B. Kerner, Wolfgang Metze (DTAG), Stephan Schmitter (RTL)

Deutsche Telekom becomes official partner of UEFA EURO 2024
(left to right: Michael Hagspihl (DTAG), Johannes B. Kerner, Wolfgang Metze (DTAG), Stephan Schmitter (RTL))
© DTAG

Next year's football highlight, UEFA EURO 2024 in Germany, is drawing ever closer. Deutsche Telekom will play a central role in this tournament and is an official partner of UEFA EURO 2024TM in the three areas of telecommunication services, sponsorship and media rights. At a media event in Cologne's RheinEnergieSTADION today, the company presented details of this triple partnership and announced extensive cooperation with RTL in the production and broadcasting of the matches.

Michael Hagspihl, Senior Vice President Global Strategic Projects and Marketing Partnerships, said at the event about Telekom's role: "One of football's great strengths is its power to connect people and trigger a wave of enthusiasm at a major event like UEFA EURO 2024TM. We want to anchor this emotional component more firmly in the collective consciousness of fans again. Telekom stands for connections across all borders like no other company. We want to help make the UEFA European Football Championship in Germany an unforgettable event for everyone. Close, cosmopolitan and with sporting highlights that we will remember fondly for a long time to come. Through our involvement in three important areas, we are also impressively underlining the special importance of the tournament for Telekom."
UEFA marketing director, Guy-Laurent Epstein said: “UEFA is thrilled to welcome Deutsche Telekom to the UEFA EURO 2024 commercial partner family. The unprecedented three-pillar partnership underlines UEFA’s and Deutsche Telekom’s common objective of connecting fans across Germany in a more comprehensive way during the four-week tournament. We look forward to collaborating with Deutsche Telekom towards a successful UEFA EURO 2024.” 

Telekom's three-pillar partnership model at UEFA EURO 2024

  1. Digital infrastructure: Telekom enables high-speed and stability
    As the official partner for telecommunications services, the company will ensure the networking of the ten stadiums and all fan zones in the host cities as well as the 24 team basecamps and training zones. Telekom is also responsible for the data links to UEFA's International Broadcast Center (IBC) in Leipzig, from where the TV images of all matches are broadcast worldwide. Telekom will also set up and operate extensive IT networks (LAN and WLAN) in the stadiums to ensure smooth transmission of the TV images and communication for media representatives. The company will also be responsible for incorporating the UEFA EURO 2024 headquarters and its data centers into the overall network. 
    "Our core business is fast and stable networks. We enable connections that meet all requirements. That's why we see a key part of our role in presenting Germany as a pioneer of modern connectivity at UEFA EURO 2024TM," added Michael Hagspihl.
  2. Sponsorship: High brand visibility as a national sponsor of UEFA EURO 2024
    As part of the sponsorship partnership, Telekom will present UEFA's flag bearer programme and recruit the national flag bearers for all matches. In addition, the sponsorship package includes presence during all matches on the perimeter boards shown on the TV feed in Germany, digital rights on UEFA's platforms visible in Germany and use of the UEFA EURO 2024TM logo, as well as activation rights in the fan zones of the host cities. Here, Telekom will show all matches via MagentaTV at the official public viewings in Germany. Last but not least, Telekom has secured the right to use its ticket allocation to grant its customers access to matches including, for example, via the "Magenta Moments" loyalty program.
  3. Media rights: Reallocation of exclusive matches, joint studio with RTL.
    Telekom also announced news today regarding media rights. The company has acquired the media rights to all 51 UEFA EURO 2024TM matches that will be shown live on MagentaTV. In addition, the sublicensing arrangement had previously provided for ARD and ZDF to show 34 of these matches live, while Telekom had sub-licensed the 17 other matches to RTL. Telekom announced today that this initial situation has changed due to a far-reaching cooperation with RTL.
    "A tournament in our own country is the perfect opportunity for us to present MagentaTV's sports expertise to football fans.  We are therefore even more pleased that we were able to agree with RTL on a redistribution of the exclusive matches. Five matches, or more precisely, four group stage matches and one round of sixteen match, will be shown in Germany exclusively on MagentaTV. As such we are creating recognizable added value for our customers and further enhancing MagentaTV, as we did for the two previous tournaments," said Managing Director Private Customers at Telekom. 
    At the same time, the two companies announced that they would be working closely together on the coverage of the entire tournament. Among other things, a TV studio and large parts of the production infrastructure will be operated jointly. For this purpose, both partners will use premises at RTL Mediengruppe's headquarters in Cologne Deutz.
    Stephan Schmitter, Chief Content Officer of RTL Deutschland, commented: "Deutsche Telekom is an important partner for RTL Deutschland. That's why we're delighted to be launching another major project together next year with the full-scale production partnership for UEFA EURO 2024."

    About Deutsche Telekom: Deutsche Telekom Group profile

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