Sportradar, a global sports technology & data provider, revealed it intends to hire Eric Conrad to manage & oversee its North American sports content and partnership efforts. His official title will be Managing Director, Strategic Partnerships & Content, North America.
Conrad will report to its Chief Commercial Officer, Eduard Blonk.
The eponymously named US Sports Content and Partnerships team will now report to Conrad. Partnerships established in recent years have included major advances with MLB, the NBA, and the NHL.
Sportradar hopes Conrad’s appointment and elevation will help to elevate the company’s image and reach as the North American market leader in its category, as well as position Sportradar to unearth additional customer-focused value and opportunities to innovate. In the initial stages, Conrad plans to be targeting two key areas:
1. Driving continued growth through new, long-term partnerships, and
2. Maximizing commercial returns through its existing betting and media partners.
Conrad was chosen given his 20+ year career arc of transactional sports rights experience both in the media and on behalf of major professional sports leagues – effectively, two sides of a multi-billion-dollar coin.
Conrad has successfully negotiated both international and US market deals numbering in the hundreds across various sports. His professional background includes positions as part of ESPN’s Programming and Acquisition team, media sponsorship and rights positions in the NBA and with MLB, and, more recently, as Executive vice President, Sports Programming and Acquisitions at Univision. Particularly during his time at Univision, Conrad negotiated significant deals that may have surpassed his own expectations with organizations like MLS, Concacaf, FIFA, Conmebol, and UEFA.
Block sees the timing of Conrad’s new role as a great one at a time when the North American market is growing at an aggressive clip. The company also hired not long ago a new North American Group Head of Regional Sales names Michael Gandolfo.
Sportradar was established in 2001 and now employs over 3,000 full time employees across twenty countries worldwide.