During a presentation in Italy today, Yamaha Motor Co. Ltd announced that it has reached a two-year agreement with Fiat Automobiles S.p.A. to become title sponsor of the Yamaha Factory Racing Team in the MotoGP World Championship.
The Team's Official Launch took place in Milan this afternoon and the Team will be known from now on as the "Fiat Yamaha Team".
Yamaha's two Factory riders, Italian Valentino Rossi and American Colin Edwards were present at the event today as well as Yamaha Motor Company's Masao Furusawa, General Manager for Engineering Operations, Lin Jarvis, Managing Director of Yamaha Motor Racing and Davide Brivio, the Fiat Yamaha Team Director. The Yamaha line-up were joined on stage by Luca de Meo, CEO of Fiat Automobiles S.p.A.
We're very excited about our new two-year partnership with Fiat," said Lin Jarvis, Managing Director of Yamaha Motor Racing. "Fiat, like Yamaha, is a truly global brand and we feel that there is a great match between our two companies. It's good for our sport to welcome a new sponsor of Fiat's calibre and we feel sure that they will enjoy their involvement with our team. We look forward to working with them over the coming two seasons and hopefully sharing many victories together."
Fiat Yamaha Team Director Davide Brivio added "It's nice to be able to finally unveil our new livery and our new sponsorship with Fiat. It's a new start for us - a new bike, a new sponsor and a new challenge as we try to win back the title! It's been a long pre-season for us but we're finally ready for the first race this week; let's hope we can mark our first outing in Fiat Yamaha Team colours in victorious style!"
The Fiat Yamaha Team will contest the opening round of the 18-race 2007 MotoGP championship this Saturday, 10th March in Qatar.
