How do you sell sponsorships for a Formula E team? We asked Andretti, Nissan and Porsche

Attracting partners on a consistent basis has proven difficult over the years for Formula E teams, who are competing in a series still building its audience. BlackBook Motorsport speaks to the bosses of Porsche, Nissan and Andretti to find out what challenges they are facing and how they position themselves for commercial success.

January 20, 2026
Cian Brittle

Over the coming weeks, Formula One teams will be tripping over themselves to announce new partners for the upcoming 2026 season.

But while that series rides the crest of a commercial wave, Formula E teams do not yet have the same luxury when it comes to attracting partners to the sport.

After all, the all-electric series is still in only its 12th season and doesn’t command the same audiences as its combustion engine counterpart, meaning Formula E teams have to find different ways to appeal to sponsors.

Three team principals currently grappling with that challenge are Florian Modlinger of Porsche, Nissan’s Tommaso Volpe and Roger Griffiths at Andretti. BlackBook Motorsport spoke with each of them at this month’s Mexico City E-Prix to hear how they are crafting their sponsorship strategies in an increasingly competitive market.

Why do you think that Formula E has challenges when it comes to attracting partners?

Tommaso Volpe (TV): There are still some challenges. Of course I would love to have more partners, and all of us would love to have more [but] first of all, we need to put things in perspective.

This sport is only 12 years of age, so in a way, yes, we would like to have more and more and more [partners], because we feel ourselves as a tier one motorsport, because this is what it is.

But at the same time, we should not forget that when you talk to potential partners and you show them the figures, despite being stronger and stronger season after season, there is still a lack of deep awareness of the sport and this, regardless of the viewership or the broadcast [figures] that we achieve, is due to the fact that ten years ago, it was completely unknown.

Florian Modlinger (FM): I would say in the Gen3 area, it was Jaguar and us who clearly showed with the technical package and the development we had in the cars that we can make a difference.

It’s a small difference, and you need to operate very well to use the small difference, but you will not have a domination that you will win two thirds of the races with a big gap to the others.

To explain this to the partners and to create awareness [of] how close this competition level is, how important the little details are, and how they maybe can contribute to the success of a team if they are not used to motorsport and close competition, that’s a big challenge first of all.

Roger Griffiths (RG): They’re wide ranging. When Formula E first started the curiosity aspect actually got the door opened quite easily. We saw that a little bit with Extreme E as well when we were involved there.

I think Formula E … there’s a little bit more general acceptance of it. 500 million people watching on TV. The visibility is out there. It’s now creating the right opportunities for people. We’re thinking hard about how do the brands that we approach also align with our existing partners? And you know, can we not necessarily look at business to business opportunities, but can they coexist in the same space?

Tommaso Volpe (left), Florian Modlinger (centre) and Roger Griffiths (right) have led their respective teams for more than 20 combined years (Image credit: Formula E)

What does your commercial development strategy currently look like?

TV: The narrative around the team is very close to our core business strategy, and we do not look for brands for the sake of the money, to be perfectly honest with you, but we look for brands which are aligned with our narrative and want to amplify their narrative around sustainability together with us.

One source of leads, if you want, is our existing partners in the core business for Nissan, because these will already guarantee that they are aligned with the brand positioning of Nissan and what Nissan does as a company.

But of course, we also get calls from external brands which have seen our successes on track and our strong reach generated by our social media channels, which are, I believe, one of the strongest, if not the strongest in the sport.

FM: We have a big basket of activities which we could offer to partners. We present our full portfolio, and the companies have the possibility to choose. They can say, yeah, we go in the GT cars. We go in the hybrid, which is the endurance racing or the fully electric racing in Formula E, and this means this wide range, from combustion engine cars over the hybrids to the full electric.

It’s a wide, wide basket, and there’s everything in it with this big brand name of Porsche and the clear target, and I think everybody knows Porsche. If Porsche is participating, they want to win. Porsche showed how successful the brand can be. These ambitions and these targets are attracting a lot of companies.

RG: For us, and I’m sure for many others, it’s not just about putting stickers on the car. It’s about how do we truly connect the brands that we’re going after to what it is we’re trying to do, and particularly as Andretti Formula E, how can we support those brands? How can we reach those aspirations?

And we’ve moved away from perhaps the traditional motorsport, where often a deal is done just because of who you know, and it’s now really, there’s a lot more scrutiny on us. There’s a lot more justification as to why we should be doing something. Are we the right place?

There are opportunities to look at commercial deals done across two or three of the brands – could a deal be done with Cadillac Formula One that then has a spillover impact on to whether it’s the Formula E team or the IndyCar team or whatever. So, you know, we’re very aware of those strategic approaches.

For those used to the sponsor-filled cars of Formula One, Formula E cars may appear comparatively sparse (Image credit: Formula E)

Which sectors do you focus on for sponsorship?

TV: If you look at the message of sustainability, this is quite – especially nowadays – quite transversal to many sectors. I think there is no company in the world nowadays that would say, ‘I don’t care about sustainability’.

So this, of course, would give you the possibility to engage with many brands. Where the portfolio gets narrower is the moment you want to have not only a message about sustainability, but also an engagement of the brand with what you actually do on track. For instance, Coral, they don’t just put the sticker on the car, they actually help us in offsetting our CO2 emissions.

FM: It’s always important that the brands are aligned and I would not only say about the technical product, but also the culture of the company, the will, being better in everything. When we speak about TDK [for example] the general attitude needs to fit together.

RG: I mean, we’re pretty open right now. Internally we have the no go areas that we just don’t touch. You know, we’ve had people come to us with proposals, and you’re just like, as lucrative as this might sound, there is no way – [like] OnlyFans.

I’ve had a couple of approaches on that one, and I’m just like, ‘can I stand in front of a car that’s got OnlyFans? Probably not.’ And I’ve seen some weird ones in IndyCar racing in the past, like there is no way I would have that on my car.

And the way I look at it is, would I be comfortable in the past taking this deal to Michael [Andretti] and standing in front of him and saying ‘I think we should do a deal with so and so’, or Dan Towriss now.

How do you measure return on investment in these partnerships?

FM: I think this is for Porsche or for the Formula E team to measure. This is one thing, but this question, I think you would also need to ask the partners for what gains they have from us, which chances they see and there I have to repeat myself.

It’s not only TV numbers, visibility, success. It’s also the opportunity to develop things, to evolve, maybe their technologies, their products, and to maybe integrate or supply them in the future in the broadcast.

RG: I can give you an example. When we were with TE Connectivity, it wasn’t necessarily about the exposure on the TV. TE Connectivity used it as an opportunity to bring customers to the race track. And you know that there was many stories.

They told us: ‘We’ve been having conversations with these people for 18 months. We’ve not been able to push it forward. We had the guy or lady at the track for just one weekend, Monday morning, Tuesday morning, we concluded a US$800,000 deal.’

They said that’s how they measure it. You know, for them, it was about connecting to their customer base. It was about being able to communicate new product information, and then it was getting deals done. So, they weren’t so interested in the TV aspect.

Looking to the future, what will be the big commercial growth areas in Formula E?

TV: AI of course. I think we are investing in it for the race strategy and race management, so partners that can not only be suppliers, but also partners to use the platform to promote themselves.

For sure, it will be a new area of innovation in general. Of course, you will always have financial companies, but I think AI probably is the main sector where we will have new brands coming in the future.

FM: When you see our sponsors and our partners, there’s a lot of technical background. It’s software, hardware for the cars and as electro mobility is growing and growing, it’s a steady growing process.

This will become more and more important, and you will see new partners coming, but there we have to see the Gen4 arrival, I think also companies which are active in different other motorsports, they will look more and more [at the series].

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