Bid for Marketing Rights Hits eBay

The marketing rights to The Sausalito Challenge, a boat that will compete for the 32nd America's Cup, are being auctioned on eBay, and an opening bid of $18 million was made yesterday shortly after it started.

The auction runs through April 23, unless someone chooses the "Buy It Now" option and agrees to pay $35 million.

"eBay has told us this is their highest-priced auction ever and we had our minimum bid in the first 12 hours," John Sweeney, co-founder of The Sausalito Challenge, which will begin sailing trials for the Cup campaign this year, said in a statement.

The exclusive rights package offers the winning bidder the opportunity for worldwide marketing exposure during The Sausalito Challenge's campaign for the 32nd America's Cup contest, which begins June 23, 2007 in Valencia, Spain.

"Most America's Cup teams have six or eight sponsors, which dilutes the value of the marketing," Sweeney said. "We know that a number of very large corporations have downloaded information from our Web site and we believe there is an adventurous company out there that will see the tremendous value here and want to own this package."

The Sausalito Challenge package has an undisclosed reserve price, which must be met for the sponsorship and marketing rights to be awarded. A number of large corporations have expressed interest privately, Sweeney said.