Sports team that is financed and run by a manufacturer or other organization in a broad sense
For the motorsports term, see Factory-backed.
Players of PSV posing with the European Cup together with Frits Philips, chairman of the BOD of Philips, after their 1988 European Cup Final victory over Benfica in Stuttgart
A works team, sometimes also referred to as factory team and company team, is a sports team that is financed and run by a manufacturer or other business, institution, or organization in a broad sense. Works teams have very close ties with their main sponsor and owner, and usually incorporate its logo, its name, or both, in the sport club or team logo. Sometimes, works teams contain or are entirely made up of employees of the supporting company.[1][2] In motorsport, a works team or factory team is a manufacturer that builds its own car or motorbike including the engine.[3]
Company teams are owned, sponsored and managed by companies in order to raise awareness about those companies' brands, being usually named after those companies and brands as part and parcel of those companies' marketing strategy.[4][5][6] Sometimes a single company (e.g. Red Bull GmbH)[7] owns more than one team named after it competing in different sports or even in the same sport.[8][9][10]
When they meet certain criteria, college and university teams, also known sometimes as student teams, competing in semi-professional or professional leagues and championships, instead of exclusively competing in university/college level sport, have been considered works teams as well. In some regions of the world like Europe and Latin America, university/college sports teams are in many instances fully-integrated in the same national sports league or championship system where amateur, semi-professional and professional teams and athletes compete in one of many divisions of the system's pyramid.[11][12]
Many works teams, factory teams or student teams were started to give staff or students some exercise and entertainment and eventually became professional teams without actually having workers, factory workers or students in their squads, but retained their original names to reflect their historical background.[13]
^Evans, Chris (6 November 2020). "A history of work teams: The famous clubs with roots in industry". The Set Pieces. Retrieved 29 August 2023.
^"42 Football Teams With Sponsor Names - Update With 15 New Teams & Sponsors Industry". Footy Headlines. Retrieved 29 August 2023.
^"Where Aston fits in the great F1 'works team' debate". The Race. 7 February 2020. Retrieved 29 August 2023.
^Hussain, Khizer (2 December 2023). "The 8 Biggest Brand Sponsors in Sports". sportinglad. Retrieved 6 March 2024.
^"What Football Teams Are Named After a Sponsor? | Football Betting Sites". 15 December 2021. Retrieved 6 March 2024.
^Ovalle, Jorge (17 December 2018). "Why are there soccer teams with company names?". LatinAmerican Post. Retrieved 6 March 2024.
^"Red Bull soccer teams around the world". InsideSport.com. Retrieved 6 March 2024.
^"The issues with multi-club ownership: City Football Group, Red Bull, more". ESPN.com. 14 July 2023. Retrieved 6 March 2024.
^"Who owns your Premier League club?". BBC Sport. Retrieved 6 March 2024.
^"RB Leipzig and Red Bull Salzburg to compete in Champions League after UEFA ruling". Sky Sports. Retrieved 16 April 2024.
^Miller, Andrew (7 October 2018). "In Europe, you don't play high school or college sports. Some think U.S. should follow suit". Post and Courier. Retrieved 15 April 2024.
^"Do European colleges have sports?". Beyond The States. 12 April 2023. Retrieved 15 April 2024.
^Evans, Chris (1 July 2019). "The history of works teams: from Atlético Madrid to British Airways FC". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 15 November 2023.
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sealed the win of the 1964 F1 World championship with John Surtees, as the worksteam competed the last two races (the United States Grand Prix and Mexican...
same 4-litre engine but with fuel-injection now put out 420 bhp. The worksteam had a pair of closed-cockpit versions for John Surtees/Ludovico Scarfiotti...
January 1968. In the next race, the 1968 Spanish Grand Prix, Team Lotus became the first worksteam to follow this example, with Graham Hill's Lotus 49B entered...
South African Grand Prix on 1 January 1968. Five months later, the first worksteam, Lotus, followed this example when it entered its cars painted in the...
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the league, and more. Social group Sports club Sports franchise Worksteam "Sports team". TheFreeDictionary.com. Retrieved 2018-08-30. "Sports professional...
failure of the worksteam, the winners were Masten Gregory and Jochen Rindt in the North American Racing Team (NART) car – the first non-worksteam to win since...
Gulf Team, which became the official Porsche team, and also the official development partner. During tests at the Österreichring at Zeltweg, works drivers...
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was known as BSG Volkswagenwerk Stadt des KdF-Wagen, a worksteam.[citation needed] This team played in the first division Gauliga Osthannover in the...
full worksteam, after much development work in 2001. The Benetton team had been sold to Renault in 2000, and was renamed Renault F1 for 2002. The team did...
One teams used independently developed Alfa Romeo engines to power their cars. In the early 1970s, Alfa provided Formula One support for their works driver...
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the 1970s for the factory Porsche team, with the RSR Turbo, 935 and 936. In 1978, Martini only sponsored the worksteam in Le Mans, while in 1980 they were...
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