When TeamViewer first partnered with the Mercedes Formula One team back in 2021, the company was better known for being the new shirt sponsor of Premier League giants Manchester United than for its software credentials.
The aim of both deals was to drive awareness of TeamViewer’s portfolio during a global pandemic which catalysed digital transformation in the business world and drove demand for remote working solutions.
The logic was that the global appeal of English soccer and Formula One would deliver both visibility and a high-profile platform to showcase the breadth of its portfolio, which had expanded beyond remote access software to a suite of digital workspace solutions.
TeamViewer is adamant that both deals were a success in that regard. However, while the Manchester United agreement was amicably, but prematurely, terminated, the company opted to extend its relationship with Mercedes beyond the initial five-year period.
The world’s most technologically-advanced sport continues to give it direct access to a worldwide audience while providing tangible use cases that go beyond a focus on traditional sponsorship inventory.
“F1 has a global audience, a global market appeal, and when we look at the demographics of fans, they fit our ideal customer profile, which is enterprise IT decision makers,” Faith Wheller, vice president of brand and sports partnerships at TeamViewer, tells BlackBook Motorsport.
Indeed, TeamViewer has doubled down on Formula One by further embedding itself in the wider motorsport landscape by signing on as an official partner of F1 Academy. In doing so, it becomes the first technology partner of the all-female series – and one of the few companies to sponsor F1 Academy that was not previously attached to Formula One’s sponsorship portfolio.
To maximise the benefits of this dual strategy, TeamViewer stresses it must have the right approach across both championships to avoid the pitfalls of a limited marketing strategy.
‘If we don’t have stories to tell, then it is just the branding on the car’
Like other major tech vendors, TeamViewer is infusing its capabilities with artificial intelligence (AI). The TeamViewer One platform intelligently detects and resolves IT issues before they affect operations – something that can have meaningful impact in the tech-dependent arena of Formula One.
Mercedes adopted the platform in April, providing TeamViewer with a ready-made use case to present to organisations in other industries.
“Mercedes are such great partners, they want to work with us, and they want to support our business,” explains Wheller. “They’ve seen the value of TeamViewer One… so it is literally a partnership, they want us to succeed.
“It’s important for us to be able to continually develop these use cases with the team because, if we don’t have those stories to tell, then it is just the branding on the car.”
Formula One gives TeamViewer a competitive environment to test its wares. It helps that Mercedes was a TeamViewer customer prior to the original deal in 2021 and, because of financial regulations in Formula one, needs to see tangible results from the relationship.
“Mercedes needs to see value [using the technology] because they have to pay for it and it’s within the cost cap,” Wheller says.
Of course, there are significant marketing upsides. TeamViewer sees its best results engaging with fans through its access to Mercedes drivers George Russell and Kimi Antonelli, with the former recently featuring in a television advertising campaign for the company. The team’s recent on-track success is also amplifying the benefits.
“When the team’s winning, we’re winning… Our branding is on the back [of the driver’s overalls] and around the collar, as well as on the car, so the media value we’re getting from the team right now is great, and you can start to equate that back into media dollars too,” says Wheller.
The role of race day hospitality
Race hospitality is an ideal forum to convert awareness into paying customers, allowing TeamViewer to be in the same room with potential clients. One thing the firm learned from its Manchester United partnership is that it’s much easier to convince a customer to come to a Formula One race than another sporting event.
“The difference with Formula One compared to … any other sport is that you can actually go to the event and you can be fan of any team… whereas if you go to football, if you’re not a fan of either of those teams, it’s quite hard to engage,” Wheller says.
However, there are often multiple companies seeking to invite the same people to the track. This is why Mercedes sees hospitality as a relationship building exercise rather than a pure sales activity and why it is constantly thinking about how it can differentiate its offering.
At this season’s race in Miami, for example, TeamViewer welcomed Mercedes’ IT director Michael Taylor for a dinner and Q&A session with customers which they “absolutely loved”.
“What we try to do is make the activation around the event appealing,” Wheller explains. “It doesn’t matter [who invites you to] the Paddock Club, you get the same experience. But if we can then get an appearance from a driver or a senior manager of the Mercedes team to come for dinner with us in the evening, that’s different.”
There are other benefits to being part of Mercedes sponsorship portfolio. Appearing on the Mercedes car alongside other multibillion dollar companies gives TeamViewer significant legitimacy by association and a network to leverage.
“A couple of years ago, we said [to Mercedes] we never get to network with your other tech partners and we all must be inviting senior IT decision markets to this event. They must get multiple invites from the partners of Mercedes, let alone the other teams,” recounts Wheller.
So, Mercedes staged a tech forum on the Friday before the race weekend. This helped open doors for TeamViewer and, for Wheller, “was one of the reasons why we wanted to extend our partnership with them because they’re helping our business grow”.
Esmee Kosterman drove the TeamViewer-backed F1 Academy entry at last season’s round in Zandvoort (Image credit: Getty Images)
‘We want to be part of this revolution’
TeamViewer’s approach to the partnership is about long-term vision rather than short-term gains. Which is one of the reasons why it is partnering with F1 Academy to encourage greater diversity and inclusion in the technology space.
“We want to be part of this revolution,” says Wheller. “We want to be helping to contribute to that brand awareness and visibility of young girls wanting to get into motorsport.”
Last year, TeamViewer supported this by backing the wildcard entry for Esmee Kosterman at the Zandvoort round.
The TeamViewer car driven by Kosterman featured images of over 200 women across sport, technology, business and bore the number 86, a number which reflects the 86 per cent of women believe visible female leaders are key to achieving workplace gender equality, according to TeamViewer’s Women in Sport Tech report.
Kosterman is now contesting a full F1 Academy season with Lego in 2026.
This year, TeamViewer will support an as-yet-unnamed driver at the Austin round and evolve its approach from last year to work with local communities, including Girls in Tech, Girls Who Code, and Austin Women in Technology.
It is this support that underpins TeamViewer’s approach to F1 Academy. Wheller claims that 76 per cent of the fanbase is female, a figure which inspires TeamViewer’s involvement.
“We want to be around for the next 20 years, and we want young females to want to come and work with us at TeamViewer in engineering, IT roles,” Wheller says.
“It’s not about measuring ROI for us, it’s much more around looking at the brand preference and our contribution back to those key initiatives.”
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