No Twitter in China? No problem.
The NFL announced Wednesday that it entered a strategic partnership agreement that includes the live streaming of games with Sina Weibo, the widely used social media platform in China.
Weibo will live stream the final Sunday Night Football game of the season on New Years Day when the Detroit Lions host the Green Bay Packers along with three playoff games and the Super Bowl. Six regular season games had been live streamed in recent weekends on Sina Weibo, according to the NFL.
“We are excited about working with Sina Weibo to stream NFL games to millions of fans,” NFL China managing director Richard Young said in a statement. We’re confident this will be a valuable long-term partnership for the NFL and our sponsors in China.”
The NFL also this season is streaming ten Thursday Night Football games on Twitter to a global audience, but that social media site is blocked in China.
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The deal with Weibo enables not only live streaming, but also gives Sina the rights to highlights and non-game video-on-demand clips.
According to the NFL, the league has more than 1.5 million online viewers in China each week and averages more than five million views of NFL clips in the country.
“We are glad to launch this strategic partnership with the NFL,” Zhang Zhe, the head of Sina Weibo Sports, said in a statement. “We look forward to helping the NFL grow their Chinese market and explore more commercial opportunities, while also providing our Weibo users with a better opportunity to watch and quickly share LIVE games and highlights. We strongly believe that social media is a core platform to promote and consume domestic and international sports events.”