2024 has been a busy year for Manchester United football club, as they embark on a top-to-bottom restructure. This restructure has been spearheaded by Sir Jim Radcliffe, who purchased completed the purchase of a 27.7% stake in the club for £1.25bn in February. 

Changes have been considered and made at the boardroom level, as well as the staff. However, a major change the club has experienced is that of a new partnership with Qualcomm in a 3-year deal. The US technology firm was recently unveiled as Manchester United’s front-of-shirt sponsor. The branding of Qualcomm subsidiary Snapdragon produces processors for an estimated 3bn devices globally; and will feature on both the men’s and women’s kits for the upcoming 2024/25 season. 

Qualcomm’s Vice-President of Marketing, Carmen True, spoke to The Drum on the thinking behind the major partnership and why Manchester United specifically appealed the most: 

“We chose to do it because it’s really the intersection of where our consumers are. They’re over a billion-strong globally and in the key markets we have… Manchester United is really unmatched. We’ve had a partnership agreement with them for a while and it has just been amazing."

Before the July 1st unveiling of the new kit, Carmen True stated that the launch video featured “an amazing anthem from a very famous Manchester United player,” whose name she was unable to share at the time (it was later revealed to be none other than Eric Cantona). “The film is just absolutely fantastic.”

She also revealed the range of activities which are planned for the next year thanks to the partnership: “One of the unique values that Snapdragon and Manchester United have together is that this presents, from a global brand perspective, an opportunity to connect with fans all over the world and that’s very important to us as we build our Snapdragon brand. So you’re going to start to see activations more globally out there, but also it activated across our social platforms.”

Watch Manchester United’s kit launch video below: