Atlassian chief revenue officer Brian Duffy has called its newly announced title sponsorship of Formula 1 motor racing team Williams a “unique opportunity” to aid the team not just commercially but technically.
Announced last week, Atlassian is Williams’ first tile sponsor in five years and is also serving as the team’s official technology partner and official collaboration software partner, and will implement its “system-of-work” project management solutions across Williams operations.
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Speaking to Sportcal (GlobalData Sport), Duffy explained exactly how this will work, revealing that Atlassian is embedding a team within Williams to enhance its internal operations.
“We are sitting down with their CIO [chief information officer] to understand where are the main problems for them as an organization, from a technology perspective. We're going to be working with the CIO’s team in terms of laying out their roadmap, where we fit in on the roadmap to help make them successful, and then we will roll up our sleeves and start executing against it.
“With the solutions that we have, we can deploy many of them very, very quickly, which allows the business to go live and then to see the impact a lot quicker, because they’re cloud-based solutions.”
In terms of commercial attractions to the sponsorship meanwhile, Formula 1 has experienced a significant rise in popularity in recent years, attracting a new and diverse audience, notably through the F1:Drive to Survive Netflix docu-series.
Atlassian branding will appear across the Williams car, on the apparel and race suits worn by its two drivers and team staff, and across its physical and digital environment, including on its social media and digital channels.
Formula 1 is a strong market for B2B brands engaging in sponsorships thanks to its highly technical business operations surrounding car operation, as well as its global reach and popularity.
This fed into why Atlassian chose now to invest in the sport through Williams, with Duffy adding: “F1 in the past couple of years, with the help of Drive to Survive among other things, has certainly reached a new audience.
“We do see [the series’] growing audience in the US and other parts of the world as an opportunity for us to reach more and more customers and to elevate our brand, which is very important to us.
The presence of a strong driver pairing in Thai-licensed driver Alex Albon and Spaniard Carlos Sainz Jr. sporting the Atlassian brand at every race will also be a boon to the brand. The driver pairing boasts over 14 million combined followers on Instagram alone, with Williams adding another 4 million, all massive compared to Atlassian’s 72,600.
James Bowe, Williams Racing’s commercial director, claims F1’s global fanbase ass upwards of 700 million people, and the F1 season is broadcast in over 200 territories around the world, making it one of the most globalized singular sports properties on the planet.
Although it is floated on the US Nasdaq Stock Exchange, Atlassian is based in Australia, which will host F1’s season-opening Grand Prix in 2025, followed by three separate stops later in the US in the year.
Duffy continued: “We already have north of 300,000 customers, and we have now a stage around the world whereby we can welcome our customers to come join us at various Grand Prix events, which is exciting.
“We also have an opportunity to now showcase the investments that we're making into Williams and the transformation journey that they are going to go on. We're committed to making Williams a showcase example of a system of work which is our proposition to the market, which is exciting. And it's an opportunity for us to get closer and closer to our customers, which is very important to us.”
The attraction to F1 at the moment, and to a Williams team that is looking to grow in strength after a down period, is evident in how the side has bolstered its commercial portfolio as of late.
Just this week (February 17) Williams announced a new commercial partnership with SuperGroup the international betting operator.
The multi-year deal is centered around SuperGroup’s Betway sports betting brand, and its casino brand Jackpot City, which will gain official partner status in the categories of betting partner, casino partner, gaming partner, score partner, and live score partner.
In addition, both brands will gain a presence on the soon-to-be-presented livery of the Williams car and will activate alongside each other through the F1 campaign.
Recently, the team also managed to coax Spanish bank Santander, previously a high-profile sponsor of the iconic Ferrari team, into its partnership portfolio, and also added premium travel goods brand Carl Friedrik as an official licensee.
