Jim Ratcliffe’s Ineos Grenadiers team announced an official rebrand on Tuesday, with the outfit now set to be known as Netcompany-Ineos Cycling Team.
As reported last month, Danish IT firm Netcompany have come on board as a co-title sponsor after signing a five-year deal worth £87m, with the significant injection of cash intended to bring its budget in line with some of the sport’s biggest teams.
This marks the first time since Ratcliffe bought the team - formerly known as Team Sky - in 2019 that it will have a co-title sponsor.
Team Sky dominated cycling in the 2010s, winning seven Tour de France titles in eight years, but it has not won a Grand Tour since the Giro d’Italia in 2021.
It has long since been superseded by super-teams like Visma-Lease a Bike and UAE Team Emirates-XRG, the latter home to the all-conquering Tadej Pogacar, but the new deal is hoped to make it competitive once again at the top level.
The team was strengthened by the signings of Frenchman Kevin Vauquelin and 23-year-old Scot Oscar Onley, who finished fourth in last year’s Tour de France, over the winter, and its increased budget should enable it to attract more top talent.
Ratcliffe has invested £30m per year but needs further cash injections to close the gap to the £51m annual budget of Pogacar’s team.
Netcompany’s investment will boost the team’s coffers while Ineos will remain a sponsor, as will French oil and gas multinational Total Energies, who are currently its official jersey sponsors.
Copenhagen-based Netcompany has recently been named Heathrow Airport’s main digital operations partner and also works with HMRC.
Team Sky were famous for their policy of exploiting “marginal gains” under team principal Dave Brailsford, and the new deal appears to hark back to that era with its dependence on Netcompany’s AI platform Pulse.
Part of the reason for Ineos’ waning influence in the sport was that other teams caught up to the standards of increased professionalism it set, particularly by the end of the 2010s. The move to wholly embrace AI can be seen as a return to the team’s roots, trying to establish an edge over its rivals via new technology.
Netcompany’s chief executive Andre Rogaczewski said the partnership intended to “demonstrate the impact of cutting-edge technology and AI at the highest level of sport”.
“Together, we aim to enable smarter decision-making, strengthen competitive advantage, and help the team in winning the Tour de France again.”
Brailsford said: “Pulse allows us to orchestrate our data into clear insights that support faster, better decisions when it matters most. Ultimately, it’s about creating the conditions to win the Tour de France.”
Former Tour de France winner and now director of racing Geraint Thomas said the AI platform “gives us confidence in the systems and in the quality of the data and information we’re working from in real time, so everyone is aligned and working off the same hymn sheet”.
He added: “From my side, it’s about creating an environment where riders can focus fully on racing, while the team around them is connected and making the best possible decisions. If we get that balance right, it will make a real difference when it counts.”
The team will race in new kit and new colours starting with the Giro d’Italia, which begins on May 8.