Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and the ATP Tour — the highest level of men’s professional tennis — have agreed to a five-year partnership that includes naming rights for the global rankings, the latest move by the kingdom into that sport and others.
The ATP already had a deal that placed its Next Gen ATP Finals — a tournament for players 21 and under — in Jeddah from 2023 through 2027. The arrangement announced Wednesday includes courtside branding for the PIF at the season-ending ATP Finals and tournaments in Beijing, Madrid, Miami and the California city of Indian Wells.
Pepperstone had sponsored the ATP rankings since 2022.
Massimo Calvelli, the ATP’s chief executive, called the new agreement “a major moment for tennis,” and the tour’s announcement touted ways in which it hopes the sport will continue to grow in Saudi Arabia.
Tennis has been consumed lately by the debate over whether the sport should follow golf and others in making deals with the wealthy kingdom, where rights groups say women continue to face discrimination in most aspects of family life and homosexuality is a major taboo, as it is in much of the rest of the Middle East.