Sponsorships

Ayrton Senna holding a Sonic the Hedgehog-shaped trophy after winning the Formula One 1993 European Grand Prix. Sega sponsored the whole event in addition to sponsoring the (winning) Williams team that season.

Over the years, Sega has sponsored many events and services in order to further market its brand or products. Typically, companies such as Sega would invest money in a sponsee, allowing them to fund their activities, in exchange for a prominent display of the brand or products Sega were trying to advertise.

The following lists instances where this has occurred. Not included are cases where Sega has helped established a venture (such as GameWorks or SegaWorld London), only to withdraw their name later on.

Sports

American Football

NFL Players Party 1996/Super Bowl XXX

Sega sponsored the 1996 NFL Players Party, held at the Phoenix Civic Plaza on Thursday, January 28. In addition to ofering tickets to Super Bowl XXX, there were live performances by Meat Loaf and Sawyer Brown.

Featured were 17 video game banks, with 4-8 Sega Genesis and Sega Saturn systems. Dieon Sanders made an appearance and competed (and won) against Rod Woodson. Other sporting celebrities were also on hand to write autographs. A set of collectable cards were also released to commemorate the event.

Sega also collaborated with Cartoon Network to advertise the party with call-in contests for tickets and participating Best Buy stores also offered forms for the contest.

Sega made available "on satellite" its Super Bowl predictions, using Prime Time NFL Football Starring Deion Sanders to simulate the match. Sega were claiming that with incorporated NFL statistics, the game could predict outcomes with a 85-90% accuracy rate.

Baseball

• Sega Sports @ Centerfield

Basketball

Levallois Sporting Club Basket (France; 1993/1994??)

• 

  Levallois Sporting Club Basket team (1993/1994 Season), standing, from left to right: unknown man, assistant coach Sylvain Lautié, #7-Patrick Cham, #9-Michael Brooks, #15-Patrick Plantier, #12-Richard "Rick" Doyle, #8-Christian Garnier and head coach Jacques "Jacky" Renaud, crouching, from left to right: #14-Terence Stansbury, #11-Frédéric "Freddy" Hufnagel, #10-Michel Wachowiak, #6-Laurent Sénéchal and #5-Éric Fleury

• 

  Michael Brooks of Levallois Sporting Club Basket blocks American professional basketball player Marcus Webb of Pau-based French professional basketball club Élan Béarnais, during a match of the 1993/94 Season of LNB Pro A, the top-tier level men's professional basketball league in France (Patrick Cham in the background)

• 

  Patrick Cham

• 

  Terence Stansbury

Merchandise

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Cycling

• Laurent Fignon, Tour de France (1993)
• The Sega British BMX Racing Championships 1990

1993 Vuelta a España ("Regularidad" Classification)

Sega was the official sponsor of the "Regularidad" Classification in the 1993 Vuelta a España. To promote the brand, Sega Spain transformed a big truck with a cargo space of 13,5 x 6 meters into an itinerant booth equipped with several Sega Mega Drive consoles for kids to play at no charge, which toured by all the 21 stages of the Vuelta a España, spreading joy among Spanish children.

• 

  French professional road racing cyclist Laurent Jalabert third classified of Stage 4 (A Gudiña-Salamanca) of the 1993 Vuelta a España receives the Blue Jersey (currently Green Jersey) for leading, after four stages, the overall "Regularidad" Classification (April 29, 1993)

• 

  Each winner of the "Regularidad" Classification received a Sega Mega Drive console as prize

• 

  Laurent Jalabert

• 

  Swiss professional road racing cyclist Tony Rominger receives the Blue Jersey, at the end of Stage 18 (Cangas de Onís-Gijón) of the 1993 Vuelta a España, for leading, after eighteen stages, the overall "Regularidad" Classification (May 13, 1993)

• 
• 

  Final results of the 1993 Vuelta a España "Regularidad" Classification of which Sega was the official sponsor (May 16, 1993)

• Coverage of Stage 1 (A Coruña– A Coruña) of the 1993 Vuelta a España on TVE1 Spanish television channel

• Coverage of Stage 21 (Padrón-Santiago de Compostela) of the 1993 Vuelta a España on TVE1 Spanish television channel

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

Football

Main article: Sponsorships/Football.

Golf

• 1992 LPGA Sega Women's Championship (1992)

Ice Hockey

• 6th NHL Breakout Tour (US; 2000)
• Whitley Warriors (UK; 2015-2016)

1992 Summer Olympics (Barcelona)

Sega was one of the official sponsors of the 1992 Summer Olympic Games which were celebrated in Barcelona from July 25 to August 9, 1992.

Formerly considered a "danger" for the concentration of athletes, video games were used for the first time as an entertainment for them in the 1988 Summer Olympics, in Seoul, capital of South Korea, when in an experiment, the International Olympic Committee installed a few consoles and games in the Olympic Village to entertain the athletes.

With the sucess of the experiment, the International Olympic Committee elected Sega Spain as an official sponsor and one of the several providers of entertainment for the 1992 Summer Olympic Games in Barcelona.

Sega set up a 550 m² venue in The Olympic Village of Poblenou (La Vila Olímpica del Poblenou) divided into five zones (one for athletes only) equipped with 200 Sega Mega Drive Consoles, 60 Sega Game Gear consoles, and 11 arcade cabinets distributed across them.

Despite not being the only entertainment available to athletes and visitors in the Olympic Village, since it was equipped with a cinema, a discotheque, a Scalextric slot car racing track, Karaoke, bars and even had a beach nearby, the venue was a favourite among athletes and visitors with the special arcade cabinet R-360 becoming such a hit that caused enormous queues and forced Sega Spain to implement a minimum of plays per person to avoid conflicts as all the cabinets were put in "free play" mode.

With an attendance of 500 visitors per day, one of the most illustrious of them, in addition to the athletes, was Su Majestad el Rey de España (His Majesty the King of Spain) Felipe VI of Spain (at the time the Prince of Asturias) which was a fervorous fan of the special arcade cabinet R-360, and eventually became an expert in it (he is an aircraft pilot formed in the Spanish Air Force Academy Academia General del Aire in Murcia, Spain).

According with an interview conducted by Spanish magazine Ultima Generacion to George Taylor (George Paul Taylor, Senior Operation Manager at Sega Amusements Spain S.L. from 1995 to 1997), Mario Cotza(Managing Director) and Angél G. Gallego (Sales Manager) of Sega Amusements Spain S.L. in July 1995 the experiment paved the way for Sega to open Sega Park arcade venues in Spain, with the first of them, the Sega Park Madrid, opening on October 19, 1995.

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

  A life-size cutout of Sonic the Hedgehog, welcomes visitors at the entrance to the venue

• 
• 

  Two Chinese athletes playing Rail Chase

• 

  A Time Traveler arcade cabinet

• 

  Two Japanese athletes playing a game on a Sega Mega Drive

• 

  A Galaxy Force II arcade cabinet

• 

  An Exhaust Note arcade cabinet

• 

  An athlete plays Desert Strike on a Sega Mega Drive

• 

  A reporter from Spanish magazine Hobby Consolas plays a game on a Sega Mega Drive

• 

  A special arcade cabinet R-360, the "Star" of the venue

• 

  Badge

Sega games/arcade cabinets featured

• Columns II: The Voyage Through Time (running on a Swing multi-purpose arcade cabinet)
• Exhaust Note
• Galaxy Force II
• Mega-Tech System
• R-360 (running G-LOC: Air Battle)
• Rad Rally
• Rail Chase
• Time Traveler

Motorsports

Main article: Sponsorships/Motorsports.

Film and television

¡¡Al Ataque!! (¡¡Te Pillé!!, bloopers segment; 1992/1993)

In Spain, Sega sponsored the bloopers segment ¡¡Te Pillé!! (Catch Ya!!) of the Spanish sketch, talk, comedy, variety show ¡¡Al Ataque!! (Attack!!), which ran on Spanish television channel Antena 3 from September 29, 1992 to July 6, 1993 and was hosted by Spanish Journalist Alfonso Arús Leita.

The segment would start with an exclusive Sega promotional opening featuring the title of the segment ¡¡Te Píllé!!, the host of the show Alfonso Arús Leita would then promote the brand giving an insight about Sega and its products while one of his assistants played a game on a Sega Mega Drive, the segment would ultimately finish with a Sega promotional ending in which a Sega Mega Drive, a Sega Master System II and a Sega Game Gear were publicized with the slogan ¡¡Píllalas!! (Catch 'Em!!).

Sega consoles and products were also used occasionally by comedian actors during their performances in the sketches, to promote Sega's brand even further.

• 
• 
• 

  Alfonso Arús Leita, the host of the show

• 

  A show assistant plays World Cup Italia '90

• ¡¡Al Ataque!! sketch ES Video (episode #15 of the Spanish television show ¡¡Al Ataque!!, February 21, 1993)

• ¡¡Te Pillé!! bloopers segment ES Video (episode #30 of the Spanish television show ¡¡Al Ataque!!)

• ¡¡Te Pillé!! bloopers segment ES Video (episode #33 of the Spanish television show ¡¡Al Ataque!!)

• ¡¡Te Pillé!! bloopers segment ES Video (episode #34 of the Spanish television show ¡¡Al Ataque!!)

• ¡¡Te Pillé!! bloopers segment ES Video (episode #35 of the Spanish television show ¡¡Al Ataque!!)

• ¡¡Te Pillé!! bloopers segment ES Video (episode #36 of the Spanish television show ¡¡Al Ataque!!)

Existenz (1999)

Sega sponsored David Cronenberg's 1999 film, Existenz, featuring Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jude Law. Dreamcast Kiosks were featured at the launch party.

The UK VHS and DVD releases of the film contain special Dreamcast-related material.

VHS, UK

DVD, UK
Cover

Music

Phoenix Festival 1997

Sega and the Sega Saturn sponsored the 4-day Pheonix Festival (held in Long Marston, Stratford-Upon-Avon in the United Kingdom) between the 17th and 20th July, 1997.

• 

Exhibits

Hollywood Cars (Barcelona, Madrid, Booth 5 - Batcave; 1993)

• 

  The logo of the event

• ES Promotional Video

Barcelona

• 

  Estació del Nord in Barcelona (1993)

• 
• 

  The entrance to the "Hollywood Cars" exhibition at the Estació del Nord in Barcelona (1993)

• 

  The entrance to booth 5 (Batcave) at Estació del Nord in Barcelona, which was officially sponsored by Sega in both the Barcelona and Madrid editions of the "Hollywood Cars" exhibition in 1993

• 
• 

  Legendary custom car builder/designer/collector Jay Ohrberg of Jay Ohrberg's Hollywood Cars (formerly Jay Ohrberg's Star Cars), licensor of the event, at Estació del Nord in Barcelona during the "Hollywood Cars" exhibition in 1993

• 

  Jay Ohrberg

Virtual 2!M - Realidad Virtual & Vision en Relieve (Madrid 1993)

The Virtual 2!M was an event focused on Virtual Reality and Electronic Art, organized by the Spanish technology company Realidad Virtual S.L. (founded in 1991 by José Antonio Mayo, a Spanish science journalist specialized in arts and new technologies, who was co-director of the digital culture and creativity festival Artfutura from 1994 to 2000) a subsidiary of Madrid-based Spanish multinational telecommunications company Telefónica S.A, and directed by Alejandro Sacristán (a member of the legendary Madrilenian electronic band Aviador Dro since 1980, a year after its formation in 1979, and an Expert in Virtual Reality and immersive digital content, he was a pioneer in the first wave of Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Stereoscopy and the 90s Cyberculture movement since 1992, and is currently a curator of the festival Artfutura as well as a columnist for popular science magazine Muy Interesante) which was held from May 2 through May 15, 1993 in a 1000 m² tent located in the Paseo (boulevard) de San Francisco de Sales, in Madrid (a tent previously set up for the celebrations of the V Centennial of the city of Madrid in 1993).

With a cost of 45,000,000 pesetas and held as part of the festivities of "Dos de Mayo" (May 2, Madrid's Community Day, hence the name of the event) the event was backed by the Council of Education and Culture of Madrid and many other companies including Sega (Sega Spain), which set up two booths equipped with thirty Sega Mega Drive consoles in two of the eight zones of the venue (Zone 2 and Zone 8), to entertain the visitors of the event (a total of sixty consoles).

• 

  The logo of the event

• 

  The 1000 m² tent where the "Virtual 2!M" exhibition was held

• 

  Realidad Virtual S.L. Founder and Director José Antonio Mayo, one of the organizers of the event

• 
• 

  Sega's booth at Zone 2 of the "Virtual 2!M" exhibition in Madrid

• 

  Sega's booth at Zone 8 of the "Virtual 2!M" exhibition in Madrid

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

  Virtuality gaming machines, called "pods" by the company, had a presence at the event by the hands of Barcelona-based company Machines Games Automatics, S.A., its authorized distributor in Spain

Floor plan

• 
• 
• 
• 

External links

• www.aliencenter.de/nuclearsi (Official website of the Madrilenian electronic band "Aviador Dro")
• "Amor Industrial" ("Industrial Love") Original Version, 1983 by Madrilenian electronic band "Aviador Dro" at www.youtube.com
• Construction time-lapse of The Olympic Village of Poblenou (Barcelona; 1986-1992) at www.youtube.com