The addition of the competition may increase the entire circuit’s revenue, according to family Liberty Media’s wager that the second Las Vegas Grand Prix on Saturday night.
” Las Vegas definitely did assist to enhance their presence, because it’s quite the scene, putting it on at nighttime”, Seaport Research Partners scientist David Joyce said on a mobile phone. Realistically at the right moment, in the right place: Las Vegas has a lot of success bringing new groups into town and the Sphere, so many things came up.
For Liberty Media, Las Vegas is unique because of more than just its showy setting: it’s the one race that Liberty solely controls entirely—other grand prix have regional partners who sponsor the event and distribute the proceeds. With Las Vegas as its single proprietor, Liberty can use the occasion as a testbed for company expansion.

That’s particularly true in funding. When Liberty Media completed its$ 4.6 billion merger of Formula 1 in early 2017, the league only had two part-time people working on a sponsorship arm that had 14 partners spread all over the world. In contrast, MLB had 80 people working on funding at the time of the acquisition of F1, and there were only 75 business partners in the U.S. Today, Las Vegas appears to be stepping up its sponsorship game.
” What happened in Vegas did n’t actually stay there”, outgoing CEO Greg Maffei said at Liberty’s investor day last week. ” We’ve talked a lot about how much of a greater benefit Vegas has provided to F1, but that idea has largely been dead on.”
According to Maffei, at least three of the restricted sponsors of the inaugural competition in Vegas next year have entered into international sponsorship agreements. American Express signed on as a global standard sponsor starting in 2025 after serving as a presenter last year and providing presale cards to customers and similar organizations. Similar to last year’s signing, LVMH signed on to encourage a dozen beverage companies, including Volcan Tequila, at Las Vegas activities. The LVMH administrative in charge of Volcan helped to instigate discussions between Liberty and the luxury conglomerate’s European management. Starting with the new year, LVMH will become F1’s largest world partner, according to Maffei.
The Grand Prix aimed to promote Vegas ‘ international models as well as the world. Wynn Resorts, which provided the ultra-luxurious Paddock Club experiences known as the Wynn Grid Club package for$ 1 million, was Wynn Resorts ‘ hospitality partner for the race last year. Beginning in 2018, the Wynn Grid Club will be available in Shanghai, Abu Dhabi, and Monaco.

The rise in funding is essential for Liberty, because it lags additional income streams. From a 2019 baseline through September this year, sponsorship revenue has more than doubled to$ 632 million. But that is still behind the billion-dollar-plus revenue from both media rights, up 42 % from 2019, and race promotion ( the various fees Liberty collects to run races in cities ), which is up 61 %.
” Sponsorship is significant for them, but it’s still not the main profit machine. One of the main places where buyers are looking for growth is that it is typically seen as having a high-margin income stream, Joyce said.
Still, Las Vegas does n’t deserve all the credit. When Liberty stopped treating F1 like a locked garden in terms of content, it made leaps in attracting more and younger fans. This led to a huge social media presence that has surpassed 89 million users across various platforms in the past five years. Being multi-channel with glad helped to: Netflix’s Drive to Survive behind-the-scenes line has been watched in some part by a fourth of Netflix ‘ 85 million North American customer base. Coming to cinemas following summer: a Brad Pitt, Jerry Bruckheimer F1 video. The competition plan for this year’s race, which is the 22nd of the F1 season, was also increased from 21 in 2016 to 24 in 2017. Under Liberty’s equity, Tendance is expected to attract 6 million fans this season, an increase of almost 50 %.
Expectations for enthusiast presence at Saturday’s competition have been muted; historically, there has been a decline in a race’s next year; Maffei said Liberty anticipates that the fan experience data it gathers from the 2023 edition and this year’s Grand Prix will help it distribute more innovations internationally.
” There’s been a lot of under-monetization of Formula 1, the brand”, Joyce said. ” Formula 1 and Liberty Media have a lot of lessons from putting on their own culture next time,” they said. They are more knowledgeable about how to use endorsements and are constantly experimenting with new ways to monetize enthusiasts who are present. These discoveries have application to various world-wide tribes. ]Las Vegas ] is a foundation”.