Miami, Florida, Nov. 12, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- After the 32 billion dollar collapse of FTX this past week Brandefenders is working on placing an official bid to be the new naming partner and rename the FTX Arena to The Brandefenders.com Arena for the remainder of the 2022-2023 NBA Season. After an initial balloon payment of $14 million, FTX was scheduled to make a $5.5 million payment in January and now The Reputation Management Company of Fort Lauderdale wants to land the naming rights for it's up and coming subsidiary. Brandefenders wants to negotiate terms for the renaming to help offset part of the losses the Miami-Dade arena and Peace and Prospetiy plan will face as a result of the bankruptcy of FTX.
Brandefenders has an office in Fort Lauderdale and it's headquarters in Utah. It was started by South Florida entrepreneur and business owner Richart Ruddie who also owns it's parent company The Reputation Management Co. a firm that helps with online public relations, removes negative content on the internet, and has a suite of reputation repair and monitoring services. Brandefenders and The Reputation Management Company is having it's best year ever and sees this as a great opportuntiy for a legitimate brand that truly helps people and businesses to gain exposure to the Miami Heat fans and audience that may potentially use their services. Ironically Ruddie received press for helping victims of fake news in the Cryptocurrency industry earlier this year.
The Miami Heat on Friday announced plans to end its relationship with the firm and rename its home venue, FTX Arena and pictures posted to Twitter Saturday morning showed workers removing the FTX logo from the roof of the stadium. The arena was previously named the American Airlines Arena until Sam Bankman-Fried made headlines in March of 2021 with the $135 million naming rights deal over 19 years. The deal also included giveaways of Cryptocurrency during games and sparked the initial naming rights and sponsorship run of FTX. This included sponsorships with The Golden State Warriors, Washington Wizards, F1 Racing, MLB Umpires, Tom Brady, Stephen Curry, and Naomi Osaka. Brandefenders is clear that it does not want to blanket the market with Sponsorships and focus solely on the FTX Arena/Brandefenders.com Arena.
“Miami-Dade County and the Miami Heat are immediately taking action to terminate our business relationships with FTX, and we will be working together to find a new naming rights partner for the arena,” the team said in a statement, calling reports of FTX’s demise “extremely disappointing.” Now Brandefenders expects to help fill that void as the team was expecting $2 million a year from FTX with $90 million over 19 years paid to Miami-Dade County to help fight gun violence and poverty.
