Manchester City Football Club, the recently crowned champion of the English Premier League, has bought a minority stake in Japanese soccer club Yokohama F Marinos, a three-time J.League winner owned by Nissan Motor Co.
Manchester City described the move as its first significant foreign investment in Japanese professional soccer.
The deal marks the latest move by Premier League clubs to develop their brands in Asian markets as they seek to widen their fan bases and make themselves more attractive for sponsorship deals with multinational companies around the world. Until now, the clubs haven’t taken large equity stakes in Japanese clubs.
“This partnership will contribute to the growth of the club, the club’s hometown and Japanese soccer,” said Carlos Ghosn, Nissan’s chief executive, in a statement.
Nissan described the deal as a partnership that would provide YF Marinos access to the “training methods, medical care, sport science, team management and coaching know-how” of the Sky Blues. Financial terms of the deal, announced Tuesday, were not disclosed.
While many Japanese professional sports teams are owned by or affiliated with large companies like Nissan, foreign ownership by wealthy individuals or investment groups is more common in the Premier League. Manchester City is owned by Sheikh Mansour of Abu Dhabi, via a company called City Football Group.
While YF Marinos, the current holder of the Emperor’s Cup, has been a steady supplier of talent to the Japanese national football team, the club won its last J.League title a decade ago, in 2004. While the team narrowly missed out on the title last season, it is languishing in 12th place in the current season. The club plays at the Nissan Stadium in Yokohama, the venue of the 2002 World Cup final.
Akira Kaetsu, president of the Japanese club, said the goal of the partnership was to restore the team to its former glory and to “build on that foundation to take YF Marinos into the wider Asian and world arenas.”
Manchester City’s fortunes have turned around under the ownership of Sheikh Mansour, emerging from the shadows of its more illustrious crosstown rival, Manchester UnitedMANU -0.67% to win two of the last three Premier League titles.
But United has longer ties with Japan. Playmaker Shinji Kagawa, a key member of the Japanese national team, plays for the club. The Red Devils also have sponsorship deals with Japanese companies including Kagome, the team’s official soft drink partner in Japan, and Yanmar, a maker of diesel engines.
http://blogs.wsj.com/japanrealtime/2014 ... nese-team/
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