TNS Acquires Sports Sponsorship Information Company

Leading agency Taylor Nelson Sofres is to acquire the entire share capital of Sponsorship Information Services Limited (SiS) and its interests in Sponsorship Information Services Asia Pte Limited and NetResult Limited.

SiS monitors and evaluates sponsorship of major sporting events, such as UEFA Champions League football matches, Formula One and ATP Tour Tennis, using its branded monitoring system. SiS provides many corporate sponsors with vital intelligence on sponsored events. Under its new ownership, SiS will retain this viewpoint.

Established in 1993, SiS employs 36 staff with turnover in the year ended 30 June 2001 of £2.2 million and net assets at that date of £0.2 million. Key managers will remain with the company and will continue to play a strong and active part in the development of the business, which will form part of the TNS Media Intelligence sector. It is hoped that as part of Taylor Nelson Sofres, SiS will be able to provide sponsors, rights holders and media owners, with category leading research branded solutions.

Commenting on the acquisition, Mike Kirkham, Chief Executive of Taylor Nelson Sofres, said "SiS fits well with our existing advertising measurement and monitoring businesses and expands the TNS activities in this growing research sector. We now have the opportunity to market the SiS systems across the Group and to offer clients a full range of services to measure internationally the effectiveness of their sponsorship and sports marketing spend."

Mark Cornish, Managing Director of SiS, added "This global business sector is now estimated to be valued at USD$100 billion a year. SiS will extend TNS' development in the sports market with the aim of offering a comprehensive, market leading, sports and sponsorship research service, at the international level."

Taylor Nelson Sofres is ranked as the market leader in France for sport sponsorship measurement and already provides a national and international evaluation and research service to more than 100 clients. It also runs the ESPN Sportspoll, which is a joint service of ESPN and TNS Intersearch. This is the industry standard for predicting and understanding the attitudes, interests, and behaviour of sports fans in the United States. Sportspoll gives sports marketers a tool for evaluating sponsorship opportunities at both the national and local levels.

All articles 2006-22 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas unless otherwise stated.

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