Nike is set to enter Formula 1 in a big way and at what could prove to be a pivotal time for the US sportswear giant.
After a single-driver deal with Michael Schumacher in the 1990s, followed by years of near-total absence from the sport, Sector understands Nike is now closing in on a sport-wide F1 partnership.
It is believed the agreement will see Nike replace both Puma and Tommy Hilfiger as the sport’s kit and apparel partners and sources tell Sector the deal includes a minimum marketing spend commitment from Nike, one that could be seen as ‘unusually high’ for an agreement of this kind.
Expected to sit alongside that is a broad range of licensing arrangements spanning both casual wear and performance sportswear and F1 is understood to be positioned as Nike’s major sport for marketing focus next year, with the deal pencilled in to be announced ahead of the Heineken Las Vegas Grand Prix in November.
Any potential move into F1 comes at a moment of genuine financial strain for Nike.
Shares in the company are down roughly 40 per cent over the past year and have fallen around 75 per cent over five years.
That decline is steep enough that Nike will exit the S&P 100, the index of America’s hundred largest companies, on 21 September after 18 years on the list.
China sits at the centre of Nike’s problems. The company’s sales in the country are down 13 per cent year-on-year, part of a wider retreat by Western sportswear brands including adidas and Lululemon, as consumers increasingly turn to domestic alternatives.
Anta has overtaken Nike to become China’s biggest sportswear brand, following years of relentless growth across Asia, as pointed out by Graham Ruddick, Deputy Business Editor at The Times, in his latest column.
Nike will also enter a market its biggest rival has already spent two years building out.
German manufacturer adidas entered F1 with the Mercedes-AMG PETRONAS F1 Team in 2025, added the Audi Revolut F1 Team ahead of its debut this season, and is reported to be closing in on a deal with Oracle Red Bull Racing for 2027 and beyond – a deal worth in the region of €27 million a year according to German outlet Bild.
That would give adidas three of the grid’s highest-profile teams, while Nike’s plan seems to prefer a spots-wide deal, although the Cadillac F1 Team, new to the grid this year, had its drivers Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Perez both pictured in Nike apparel at the Crypto.com Miami Grand Prix.
No formal agreement between Nike and Cadillac was ever confirmed, but the relationship is understood to have laid some of the groundwork for the wider sport-wide deal now being discussed.
Nike’s history in F1 is thinner than a deal of this scale might suggest. Its only previous involvement in F1 was a personal endorsement deal with Schumacher, signed in 1996 when he moved to Ferrari.
The deal produced customised racing boots and a lifestyle sneaker, the Air Zoom Schu, before ending in 2002 when Ferrari shifted its apparel rights to Fila. Beyond that six-year window built around a single driver, Nike has had no presence in the sport at all.
That history makes the scale of this reported deal notable in itself.
A sport-wide agreement, spanning multiple teams and a substantial marketing commitment, is a different order of investment to a boot deal with one driver two decades ago, even if it was with a seven-time world champion.
Whether it is also the kind of move that can meaningfully shift a company facing structural problems on the scale Nike is currently reporting is a separate question.
A high-profile marketing platform can rebuild visibility and cultural relevance quickly. It is considerably less certain that it can, on its own, fix a collapsing position in the world’s largest sportswear market.
