OCBC bags naming rights to Singapore Sports Hub facilities in S$50 million deal
The Singapore Sports Hub, National Stadium and Indoor Stadium will not be getting new names anytime soon.
But a number of facilities within the Sports Hub are set to be sponsored by OCBC Group in a landmark announcement made Monday morning.
The first-ever sports venue sponsorship in Singapore will place the local bank as the largest sponsorship partner of the Sports Hub to the tune of more than S$50 million over 15 years, according to OCBC CEO Samuel Tsien.
OCBC will possess naming rights to individual Sports Hub facilities, specifically the Sports Hall, Aquatic Centre, National Stadium club lounges and VIP lounge at the Singapore Indoor Stadium.
“We have to make our activities affordable, free when we can,” said Sports Hub CEO Philippe Collin Delavaud. “To do this, the project needs strong corporate partnership.”
According to the Frenchman, OCBC beat “four or five major Singapore corporations” that were vying for sponsorship and naming rights to the Sports Hub and its sprawling, billion-dollar complex in Kallang.
National icons
Delavaud joked that “except for banks and insurance companies” other parts of the Sports Hub would remain open to commercial suitors.
The National and Indoor Stadiums, however, will not be renamed, for the sake of “preserving our national icons”, said Acting Minister for Culture, Community and Youth Lawrence Wong.
Earlier, Singapore Sports Council officials were quoted as saying Singapore was “not ready” for these venues to adopt different monikers.
But Wong also mooted the possibility of either stadium being named after a Singapore personality – “somebody we wish to commemorate or remember”.
‘No big bang’
When asked about the launch and event lineup for the Sports Hub, the minister said not to expect a “big bang” but rather “progressive phases” starting in April 2014.
“There will be a series of events leading up to the potential official opening, perhaps the Southeast Asian Games in 2015,” Wong told reporters on the sidelines of the Sports Hub’s sponsorship announcement.
He added that one of these events could be the National Day Parade 2014, which the Ministry of Defence will make an announcement on “quite soon”.
Sport for all
Delavaud later suggested that the first-ever event to be held at the Sports Hub in April next year would be a “community-type” affair spanning “all types of sports across all its venues”.
This angle was echoed by OCBC officials, who declared their commitment to promoting a Sports Hub belonging to Singaporeans, for Singaporeans.
“Our sponsorship money will be directed to funding grassroots activities for the Singapore community,” said group chairman Cheong Choong Kong in his speech. “Activities which are typically not commercially viable for operators to organize.”
No specific details were provided, but Tsien promised a wide range of daily activities “as appealing to the public as possible”, including programmes, clinics and the introduction of new sports to Singapore.
