‘Important to remain involved’: Why StanChart didn’t walk away from the Singapore Marathon

[SINGAPORE] For the first time in a quarter of a century, Singapore’s annual marathon in December doesn’t have Standard Chartered (StanChart) as the title sponsor. But the bank is still very much in the frame for the country’s largest mass participation run, now known as the BYD Singapore International Marathon presented by Adidas.

StanChart has a new role as the official bank of the event, which takes place from Dec 4 to 6. It has the naming rights to the 10 km race category, which will take place on the evening of the first day.

And as Patrick Lee, the CEO of Singapore, Asean and South Asia, puts it, there was a desire to continue the longstanding association with the marathon, having helped grow the race to become the country’s premier mass sporting event over the past 24 years.

StanChart also made headlines in January with its announcement that it had signed a multi-year deal to be Formula 1’s official wealth management partner and official corporate and investment banking partner.

For the last 16 years and counting, StanChart has been the main club partner of English Premier League club Liverpool’s men’s and women’s teams, with the bank’s logo on the front of the jerseys.

BT Weekend sat down with Lee for coffee at his office in Marina Bay Financial Centre recently, and the avid runner shared more about the bank’s approach to sports sponsorship and why it matters even more today.

How did the bank arrive at the decision to go big on F1?

This was a global decision. With all our sponsorships, we look at the four “C”s – our clients, our colleagues, the community, and the commitment with a thoughtful and very long term view.

We are very excited about F1 because it very much aligns with our global network. We operate in 19 of the 21 F1 race markets. There are 900 million F1 fans and there are a lot of younger fans too.

As part of our group strategy, we are focusing more on the wealth and affluent space where we feel we are more differentiated, and that also aligns well with F1.

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We want to work more with F1 to hopefully strengthen the profile of the races. It’s not just about spending money. It’s about doing something more and building something out of this.

There have been some activations since the season started. How did those go?

We’ve done an activation in Shanghai (in March) and that was really well received by our clients and kept us busy. We will do three more this year – the Silverstone Circuit in our home market in the UK (in July), followed by Singapore (in October) and Abu Dhabi (in December).

Next year we’ll ratchet things up and do a lot more. We are just getting started, it’s still early days. When we first got involved with the Singapore Marathon in 2002, we only had 6,000 runners and last year’s event had 55,000 participants. That’s the sort of ambition we have, to build the partnership up over time.

Why did the bank choose to continue with the Singapore marathon, and in a different capacity?

There was a change of the event organiser for this year, and there was a process of renewal where they come in and they are talking to sponsors. From our perspective, we had a fantastic run as the title sponsor since 2002, and you don’t see many corporate sponsors doing this for so long. But for us, we see this as a long-term commitment. We’re very proud to have built it up to a point where 55,000 runners can take part.

So when a new organiser comes in and they want to refresh things, we fully support that. It’s always good to have renewal, so that we don’t do the same things all the time and there are new and different perspectives. 

We saw an opportunity and we felt it was important to remain involved, which is why we didn’t just walk away. We are the sponsor of the 10 km race and there will be thousands of people signed up for that.

You’ve done a few of the Ekiden races in the past, so will you be running this year?

We are the sponsor of the 10 km race, so I have to run that one! I’m looking forward to it, and seeing what my timing can be like – hopefully it will be under an hour. I enjoy running as it teaches you a lot of things about life – it’s physically good, and it’s good for your mind and mental health too.

Apart from that, I do like to go for a swim, get on the bike and cycle, and play a bit of golf whenever I have the time. We organise golf days for our corporate clients too.