In 2020, PUMA Football welcomed an important new ambassador, as we signed Brazilian superstar Neymar Jr. as the latest figurehead of our portfolio of players. PUMA also teamed up with the national team of Iceland (KSI) and launched a new club partnership with PSV Eindhoven, one of the biggest clubs in the Netherlands.
Our enlarged portfolio ensures we have leading players at the world’s biggest teams and a title-contending club presence in all major football leagues, increasing PUMA’s exposure and reinforcing our sports performance positioning.
We celebrated title wins throughout the year, with C.F. Monterrey winning the Copa Mx, Malmö FF winning their sixth Allsvenskan Swedish League title of the past decade, and Mamelodi Sundowns winning their third successive South African Premier Division.
In the 2020/21 Champions League, we saw six teams (19%) qualify for the group stage: AC Milan (Italy), Borussia Dortmund, Borussia Mönchengladbach (both Germany), FC Krasnodar (Russia), Olympique Marseille, Stade Rennais (both France), and Manchester City (England).
PUMA Football also announced new partnerships with the United Soccer League of the United States and Canada, and Shakhtar Donetsk (starting summer 2021).
In the summer of 2020, we launched a completely new boot silo: ULTRA, the lightest performance boot in the market, engineered to give our players an edge when accelerating. The ULTRA is endorsed by leading players including Antoine Griezmann, Sergio Agüero, Saki Kumagai, Harry Maguire, Nikita Parris, and Eugénie Le Sommer.
Our agility silo FUTURE was also updated, offering redefined agility through an engineered knit upper with integrated NETFIT technology for an adaptive fit, designed to enhance the playing style of our creative playmakers: Neymar Jr., James Maddison, Dzsenifer Marozsán, Marco Reus, and Luis Suárez.
Neymar Jr. is one of the world’s most recognizable athletes whose influence transcends sports. He has more than 143 million followers on Instagram and is known for his connections to other athletes and celebrities. Neymar’s creativity on the pitch, his energy, and his ability to spark pure joy for the sport make him an obvious match for the PUMA brand.
We let the world know “The King is Back”, as Neymar Jr. laced up in the iconic PUMA KING to launch our partnership. Moving forward, Neymar Jr. will be wearing the FUTURE silo as he adds to his prolific goal-scoring record and honors. In one of Neymar Jr.’s first games wearing PUMA, he followed in the footsteps of the brand icon and mentor Pelé, scoring a hat trick for the Brazilian national team against Peru, bringing his record to 64 goals in 103 international caps.
PUMA recommitted itself to handball by becoming the new sponsor of the German Handball Federation, supplying the DHB teams with PUMA kits worn at the World Women's Handball Championship at the end of 2020 and the World Men's Handball Championship in January 2021. This agreement expands our national team presence in the sport, as we already have an agreement with 2019 men’s world champions Denmark.
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