The drivers participate in practice rounds in the Drone Racing League / Allianz World Championship final at Alexandra Palaceon on June 8, 2017 in London, England.
Adam Gray | Barcroft Media | Getty Images
Sports betting company DraftKings and the Drone Racing League (DRL) announced an exclusive deal on Friday that will allow people to bet on drone racing. It should also help DraftKings to serve a younger audience.
DRL is a first person vision racing league where drone pilots compete with devices on neon-lit tracks and compete for the cash prize. DRL did not provide the amount it pays to its competitors, but in 2017 the prize amount reached $ 100,000.
The two sides did not provide the financial terms of the deal.
People in Colorado, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Tennessee and West Virginia can place bets on drone racing from their phones.
Established in 2015, DRL has sparked interest among younger sports fans over the years. It is scheduled to complete the fifth season and will have a “level 14” race event on Saturday, followed by the championship event, which has not yet been announced.
Drones used in events are designed and built by DRL. Identical models are built for each race. Each drone is worth about $ 2,000 and can travel up to 90 miles per hour.
“DRL’s innovative and exciting racing events are perfect for the personalized betting offers that we can create,” said Ezra Kucharz, business director at DraftKings, in a statement. “Our sports betting experience combined with DRL’s statistics-filled competition will make this a fun and perfect opportunity to engage your avid audience with sports fans who understand technology and love adrenaline.”
DraftKings officials told CNBC that they tested DRL’s gambling interest with its free-to-play popularity pools offered in November and were pleased with the results. The company had to switch to non-traditional sports offerings when leagues were closed last spring due to Covid-19.
The DRL alignment provides DraftKings with access to Generation Z consumers, the professional leagues that still have trouble attracting.
DRL uses the label “technology creators” to define the audience, describing the group from 16 to 34 years old as predominantly male and “deeply passionate about technology, science and games”. This group is also considered to be sports fans who do not follow traditional leagues or electronic sports as close as the millennium generation.
The DRL says that this age group looks like its current fan base.
“They are young; they are influential, they are tech savvy,” said DRL President Rachel Jacobson in an interview with CNBC on Friday. Jacobson added that the league will unlock the “next generation of betting fans” for the DraftKings.
DRL fans are three times more likely to place sports betting and 90% more interested in sports betting compared to the average global sports fan, according to data from the Wasserman Media Group.
The drone league has media rights agreements with NBC Sports and Sky Sports, owned by Comcast, the parent company of CNBC. It also has a streaming agreement with Twitter to host its pre-flight programs. The league said its Thursday program had grown to 193,000 viewers, up from 75,000 during the first show in December.
Jacobson said the company added eight new sponsorships in 2020, including sports drink maker Bodyarmor and a technology deal with T-Mobile, including building a 5G drone for the league.