UFC® CONTINUES CHINA EXPANSION WITH QUTOUTIAO PARTNERSHIP
UFC continues its China expansion with short-form video platform, Qutoutiao
SHANGHAI, CHINA – UFC®, the world’s premier Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) organization, and Qutoutiao, China’s leading short-form video platform, today announced their inaugural partnership that will bring Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fans UFC content to enjoy on-the-go.
To gain access to an array of exciting content fans in China can now follow UFC’s official account on short-form video platform, Qutoutiao (Pronounced: Chu-Tow-Tea-Ow). The newly launched UFC account will showcase live event highlights, athlete features and interviews, knock-out of the week and much more. With the rapid growth of the UFC in China, Qutoutiao is an easily accessible platform that fans can use to get to know their favourite UFC athletes and also watch localised content.
"We are always looking at innovative ways to reach more fanbase in China and provide them with premium UFC content,” said UFC Senior Vice President Asia-Pacific, Kevin Chang. “We are honored to be partnering with Qutoutiao and providing their hundreds of millions of users with engaging mixed martial arts content on a daily basis.”
The partnership comes after UFC pledged its continued expansion in China with its objective to build a rich and diverse MMA ecosystem. Later this year the UFC Performance Institute® Shanghai will open its doors in the Jing’An district providing the professional sports community with a multi-million dollar state-of-the-art facility.
“Being a short video platform targeting T2-T5 cities in China, we are so honored to bring UFC, such a premium sports brand to millions of our users,” said Qutoutiao Co-Founder and COO, Cisi Chen. “Our company was established nearly 3 years ago while the UFC has an impressive 26-year history. We are so happy to achieve such partnership with UFC and looking forward to having deeper and wider cooperation.”
UFC will be Qutoutiao’s first sports property to launch on the app, giving users increased breadth in content.
About UFC®
UFC® is a premium global sports brand and the largest Pay-Per-View event provider in the world. UFC boasts 278 million fans worldwide and has produced over 460 events in 24 countries since its inception in 1993. Acquired in 2016 by global sports, entertainment and fashion leader Endeavor (formerly WME | IMG), together with strategic partners Silver Lake Partners and KKR, UFC is headquartered in Las Vegas with a network of employees around the world. UFC produces more than 40 live events annually that consistently sell out some of the most prestigious arenas around the globe, while programming is broadcast in over 165 countries and territories to 1.0 billion TV households worldwide in over 40 different languages. UFC FIGHT PASS®, the world’s leading digital subscription service for combat sports, delivers exclusive live events, thousands of fights on-demand and original content to fans around the world. For more information, visit UFC.com and follow UFC at Facebook.com/UFC, Twitter, Snapchat and Instagram: @UFC.
About Qutoutiao
Qutoutiao Inc. is the No. 2 mobile content aggregator in China in terms of monthly average users (MAUs) and daily average users (DAUs). The Company’s flagship mobile application, launched in June 2016, Qutoutiao, meaning “fun headlines” in Chinese, aggregates articles and short videos and presents customized feeds to users.
Qutoutiao represents a new generation of technology-driven content platforms and our technology brings relevant information and entertainment to users, stimulates users’ desire to read, and ultimately improves the knowledge exchange in society. Qutoutiao’s light entertainment-oriented and easily digestible content is designed to resonate with users from tier-3 and below cities in China.
Our innovative user account system and gamified user loyalty program allows registered users to earn loyalty points by referring new users to register on Qutoutiao, by consuming content or by engaging on Qutoutiao. The loyalty programs create a strong viral effect which not only keeps users more engaged and enables tracking of users’ long-term behavior, but also optimization of content recommendations.
