The South American Football Confederation (Conmebol) has launched a tender process to secure a new agency partner to market rights for the 2019 edition of national team tournament the Copa América.
The contract will include the marketing of broadcast, sponsorship and other commercial rights connected to next year’s tournament, which will be hosted by Brazil.
The tender is being overseen by professional services firm Ernst & Young and costs $10,000 (€8,177) to access.
Interested parties will be given from February 26 to March 2 to lodge questions about the process, with responses to the tender accepted through to March 7. Participants will then have until March 13 to present their offers to Conmebol’s headquarters in Luque, Paraguay.
Conmebol is seeking a new partner after announcing in November that it had sent notice to the Datisa joint venture company of its decision to terminate an acquisition contract signed in 2013 for the marketing of broadcast and sponsorship rights to the 2019 and 2023 editions of the Copa América.
The decision came after Concacaf, the governing body of football in the Caribbean, North America and Central America, in October 2015 followed Conmebol in ending its commercial rights partnership with Datisa in relation to the Copa América Centenario, which was held in the United States in 2016.
Three of the main shareholders in Datisa were among those indicted by the US in May 2015 during the crackdown on corruption in world football. The US indictment said the three men conspired to win and retain lucrative media rights contracts from regional football federations through the payment of up to $110m in bribes. The three – Alejandro Burzaco, Hugo Jinkis and his son Mariano Jinkis – are all Argentine citizens.
Conmebol said the US legal proceedings granted it the evidence needed to terminate the contracts with Datisa and cut its links with the firm “definitively”.