New GTT Podcast Alert! Qualcomm Puts Snapdragon Front and Center at the Manchester United Tour! Qualcomm CMO Don McGuire joins Melody Brue, Robert Kramer, and Anshel Sag at Snapdragon Stadium to discuss the tech and business value behind driving brand recognition and more.
Also, check out today’s Community Shield game, where Manchester United plays Manchester City. Qualcomm and Microsoft are showcasing their strategic partnership by featuring the Copilot+ PC logo on Manchester United’s kits for the first time. The collaboration with Microsoft to highlight the Copilot+ PC logo on the back of the Manchester United kit is a testament to the strong partnership with Microsoft and its recognition of Qualcomm as a key strategic partner for the future of PCs. The Snapdragon X Series processors exclusively power the next-gen Copilot+ PCs.
The Game Time Tech Podcast is a Moor Insights & Strategy Six Five Media production.
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Transcript:
Melody Brue: Hello, welcome to Game Time Tech. I’m Melody Brue. This is Robert Kramer and Anshel Sag. We are here at Snapdragon Stadium. Qualcomm is hosting Manchester United and Real Betis how do you say that? I don’t even know how to say that.
Anshel Sag: I think that’s right.
Robert Kramer: Yeah, pretty close.
Melody Brue: We’re about to have Don McGuire, CMO of Qualcomm. We’re going to ask him a couple of questions. What do you guys want to know about? Of course for me, from my perspective, I want to know, is this kind of sponsorship worth it? It’s a lot of money.
Anshel Sag: Yep.
Melody Brue: There’s a ton of fans all around the world. It’s hard to pinpoint their ROI on that, but clearly they’ve had a lot of success with this partnership. So that’s where I’m going with the kinds of questions I want to ask him. What are you thinking?
Robert Kramer: It’s been a journey, right? So I was in Manchester about six, nine months ago. Here we are, they’re launching the jersey. There’s a huge amount of fan engagement, so I’m interested to know how the fans are going to get a little bit more out of the jersey relationship. And then what kind of data they’re gathering and how the data’s going to be used for the fans and how the data’s going to be used for the team and Qualcomm. So it’s really an interesting dynamic, that’s really exciting. But, we’re also in beautiful San Diego, which Anshel’s from, so he was kind enough to come down the road and meet us.
Anshel Sag: Yeah, I think obviously I want to know about the technology, so I want to know about where it’s going to go. Obviously, 5G is quite mature at this point, so how are we going to take advantage of 5G to enhance the gaming experience and the fan experience? And they already launched the AR experience for the jersey when they launch it, so I’d love to hear about more about what they’re doing there.
Melody Brue: Yeah. As we see the stadium filling up with people, we’re also on the day that Qualcomm announced their earnings beat, beat raise. I think we’re going to have a good mood of a lot of people here today.
Robert Kramer: Well said.
Melody Brue: So we’ve got fans, we’ve got soccer, well American football, and we’ve got a great interview with Don coming up, so this will be a good day.
Robert Kramer: Great.
Melody Brue: Glad to be here. So Don, this is the big day. Everybody’s here. Everybody gets to see all the things here in Qualcomm’s hometown. So, in terms of the return on investment with the sponsorship, what are you really looking for? You’ve got the front-of-jersey. What do you want people to see and where do you really measure that from that big investment standpoint?
Don McGuire: Well, as you know marketing is a soft science. So, there’s the emotion and the emotional part of whatever you do to attach to yourself to your audience. And then there’s the financial hard metrics. From an ROI perspective, the basic foundation of our Manchester United partnership is how we come together with one of the most revered sports franchises in the world, and how do we build to scale for the Snapdragon brand, from the awareness, all the way through to affinity and advocacy. And so that’s the basic foundation. So then we build upon that by the way we have activated and the way we’ve engaged with the team. We started small two years ago, but when we saw the ROI, we saw the attachment of their fan base to our brand, we saw the attachment of our insiders to the club, and we saw this growth in brand awareness and affinity, we decided to go big. And that’s what led us to the front-of-shirt. And that has just been an explosion by any metric you could come up with, in the first three weeks of this launch. We are simply just blown away from over a billion impressions for the brand in three weeks. The biggest, most social impressions of any front-of-shirt launch, biggest front-of-shirt launch in Manchester United History, fastest selling away kit. You name it, the metrics just go on and on and on. I think our shirt launch is bigger than the top three other teams who launched shirts this year combined. So, that’s the power of Manchester United. It’s the power of their fan base, and I think it’s the power of the brand.
Melody Brue: Yeah. So, it must be so exciting to see here, in Snapdragon Stadium, in your hometown, Qualcomm’s hometown, your hometown as well.
Don McGuire: Right.
Melody Brue: And all these people coming probably from around the world, right?
Don McGuire: Yeah.
Melody Brue: Do you have any idea of how many people have come from countries around the world and where people are coming from, the fan base that are here, not just because of Manchester United, but because of Snapdragon?
Don McGuire: Well, we’ve brought some people here. So, we brought some insiders from around the world to witness Snapdragon Mecca here at Snapdragon Stadium, but we also know that Manchester United has fans everywhere, on every corner of this planet. So, we’re sure that there are people coming that this is the closest the team has come to them.
Melody Brue: Yeah.
Don McGuire: Wherever they may live. And so we’re sure they’re here between San Diego and the match in LA, that they come and they’ve come in numbers. I went to a fan event in LA, the match at SoFi, and they were singing the songs and carrying the flags and doing what everyone does on the way to Old Trafford, so, they are everywhere. They’re pervasive and they are here and they’re showing up in numbers, so we’re excited to see a full stadium today and a great match.
Melody Brue: Awesome.
Robert Kramer: Don, it’s great to be back. I was in Manchester last November.
Don McGuire: That’s right.
Robert Kramer: And the fans around the world, you were just mentioning them, what’s interesting is you’re going to be grabbing and gathering all this data. Right? And all this data is different than what the fans are probably used to.
Don McGuire: Sure.
Robert Kramer: So what data are you gathering, or going to be gathering, and what do you think the fans are looking for? Because the fans all around the world, you mentioned like in India and China, Europe, United States.
Don McGuire: Well, we’re seeing data around attachment to the new shirts with our brand on it. And we’re seeing astronomical sales, like record-setting sales. So, that’s one way we’re getting data on, okay, the brand is playing well, the kits are playing well, and fans are buying them in the tens of millions in this first three weeks of launch. We have another kit to launch. I think that’s even going to be the most popular kit, on August 12th, so that’s one piece of data. And part of it’s anecdotal, but part of it’s actually real numbers. Another is engagements. How fans are engaging with not only the launch, but with the film that we use to launch the new kit. Choosing Eric Cantona and the storytelling that he was able to pull off.
Robert Kramer: I love that.
Don McGuire: Is the most amazing piece of sports marketing content, if I do say so myself, that has been delivered to the world in a long time, and we’re seeing the results of that.
Robert Kramer: Yep.
Don McGuire: We’re blowing numbers away on engagements, on views, on clicks, on pass-alongs, et cetera, on likes and everything. And then we’ve done an initial sentiment analysis on how fans are feeling, both Manchester United fans and Snapdragon Insiders, about this front-of-shirt launch. And about the brand and all the different attributes. And the number one sentiment across the board is joy.
Robert Kramer: Wow.
Don McGuire: And so you can’t ask for a better sentiment than Joy. And actually joyfulness is part of the Snapdragon brand ethos, so we know we’ve hit the nail on the head.
Robert Kramer: Great.
Don McGuire: Yeah.
Robert Kramer: Sounds great.
Anshel Sag: Hi, Don.
Don McGuire: Hey.
Anshel Sag: Thanks again for joining us. I wanted to talk to you about the technology aspects of this partnership. I know Snapdragon Stadium, lots of tech, lots of 5G. I’d love to know about where you plan on taking this and what new experiences and partnerships that you’ve established with Manchester United that you plan on moving forward to enhance the experience.
Don McGuire: Yeah, and as part of any brand partnership we do, the ability to showcase our technology is a critical element to any partnership. When it comes to Manchester United, there’s three or four areas that we’re really leaning in on. How do we bring the shirt to life through technology? So, as part of the front-of-shirt launch, we’ve launched an augmented reality experience,
Anshel Sag: Right. I tried that out.
Don McGuire: Right. All you have to do is hold your phone up to the logo and you could dive into Old Trafford, you could dive into Snapdragon and what is Snapdragon, because we have to build that advocacy and that affinity and that education. And all aspects of the club and our brand. So, that’s one fan experience that we’ve launched, is front-of-shirt, but we’re looking at the reimagination of Old Trafford.
Anshel Sag: Okay.
Don McGuire: And what that’s going to look like and helping them from the ground up with technology integration into what that amazing new stadium experience is going to be. And then delivering fan experiences all over the world to the 1.1 billion fans is also what we’re actually working on with the club. Beyond that, the training facility in Carrington and all aspects of Man United operations are going to be leveraging our tech. And then we’re going to be using our partnership to market our amazing technology in the product categories right where it lives. Obviously smartphones, to begin, with our original partnership and now PCs. And then we’ll be able to story tell with auto makers and auto OEMs, with AR and VR partners, with wearable partnerships, et cetera. So, we’re looking at taking the storytelling for the partnership with Manchester United across all the product categories where Snapdragon lives.
Anshel Sag: Great. And you talked a little bit about AR. You talked a little bit about 5G and infrastructure. I’m curious, what about the jersey? Do you see you guys helping Adidas, maybe integrating some technology into the jerseys?
Don McGuire: There may or may not have been discussions with Adidas on how we can bring this shirt to life through technology. Cannot confirm nor deny that that has happened.
Anshel Sag: Okay. And I think Manchester United is a huge brand, and you guys are a huge technology company. Are there any other places where you guys might be able to work together that you don’t already?
Don McGuire: Yeah, One of the things that we’re doing is, with the help of Manchester United, is they’re cross-pollinating their partners. So, just recently met with the Marriott crew. Marriott’s a big partner of Manchester United, talking about business opportunities between Qualcomm and Marriott. INEOS obviously being now one of the big owners of the club.
How can we bring business capabilities to the INEOS portfolio of companies, not only across INEOS sports, but INEOS the actual company.
Anshel Sag: Right.
Don McGuire: Whether it’s Grenadier from an auto perspective.
Anshel Sag: Which is cool.
Don McGuire: Or some of their other businesses with our industrial IoT products. So, we’re looking at business opportunities and creating opportunities across their portfolio wherever we can. And they’ve been proactive about creating those relationships, those linkages and those introductions, and then our teams take it from there.
Anshel Sag: Great. Thank you very much.
Don McGuire: Sure. Thanks for having me.
Robert Kramer: We had a great interview with Don McGuire, CMO of Qualcomm. So, we learned a little bit about ROI, about data, and a little bit about the stadium and the jersey and the technology involved. How do we wrap this up? What do you think, Anshel?
Anshel Sag: I think it’s great. I think a lot of people have been waiting for this front-of-jersey sponsorship to really launch. And I think we’re really just hitting the beginning of what is going to be a long relationship. And I think there’s a lot more potential here, and I’m excited to see where it goes.
Robert Kramer: Yeah.
Melody Brue: I think you asked an interesting question about where things could move forward. And earlier today you had on your Ray-Ban Meta glasses, which has a Qualcomm chip in it.
Robert Kramer: Yep.
Melody Brue: Those chips are teeny tiny if they can fit into glasses, so I think it’s really interesting to imagine the places it can go next.
Robert Kramer: Absolutely. Well, thank you for joining Game Time Tech. We’re here with Qualcomm at Snapdragon Stadium, Melody Brue, Robert Kramer, Anshel Sag. Please stay tuned for our weekly Game Time Tech. We’ll look forward to see you next time, and hopefully we’ll be in Manchester, courtesy of Qualcomm and Snapdragon, because they had such good numbers today.
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