LAUSANNE (SUI) - A report furnished by international media rights agency MP & Silva revealed that the XXVI U18 Baseball World Cup, held in Taichung (TPE) in early September, had a potential broadcast distribution reach of 144,050,000 million homes and potential online/mobile reach of 22 million unique users.
Twenty-eight of the forty-five games of the U18 Baseball World Cup were broadcast, including the final in which Team USA captured the gold medal, narrowly holding off Samurai Japan 3-2 in a hotly contested and exciting final.
Agreements were reached with 12 broadcasters that provided U18 Baseball World Cup coverage in 11 territories, including Brunei, China, Indonesia, Japan, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Chinese Taipei, Thailand and Vietnam.
The U18 Baseball World Cup's enormous reach potential confirms the already unprecedented level of success of the 2013 international events calendar for baseball and softball and its partners, with showcases like the World Baseball Classic, the World Cup of Softball, the U12 Baseball World Cup and the Little League World Series.
"While our annual media report has not yet been finalised, the U18 Baseball World Cup numbers confirm the most successful and record-breaking year in the history of international baseball and softball broadcast reach to date, and we are extremely satisfied with the partnership with MP & Silva and with what it continues to deliver," stated Riccardo Fraccari, WBSC co-President.
Peter Hutton, Joint-CEO, MP & Silva, said: "We are thrilled with the U18 Baseball World Cup 2013's audience reach numbers. MP & Silva has been supporting this campaign to reach unprecedented levels of awareness and popularity for baseball since 2011. Through our leadership and expertise in the Asian TV market, we were able to guarantee that the U18 Baseball World Cup 2013 was one of the most visible international baseball competitions worldwide this year".
The U18 Baseball World Cup is also part of WBSC's global development strategy to continue to expand baseball and softball's footprint.
"We are aggressively targeting youth and expansion into neighboring territories of those traditional markets where our sport is already strongly-positioned and poised for further growth," Fraccari noted.
WBSC also sanctioned the recent 2013 Baseball Challenge, which was a three-game series between Chinese Taipei and Japan that was broadcast in prime-time in both Chinese Taipei and Japan.
For media inquiries, please contact: media@worldbaseballandsoftball.org.
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