UCI looking for investors for GCP

Amaury Sport Organisation has rejected an offer from the UCI to invest in the Global Cycling Promotion (GCP), the arm of the governing body charged with promoting cycling in a global sense and race organiser.

Bloomberg reports that UCI President Pat McQuaid said the organisation was looking for alternate investors in the wake of ASO's non-interest.

"We have spoken to people of means" McQuaid said, declining to directly identify the parties.

Meantime ASO, which assisted the GCP in organising the parcours for the Tour of Beijing which was held for the first time late last year, "said for the moment they'd like to stay in the role of service provider," McQuaid added.

The move comes off the back of the mooted plans for a 'breakaway league', backed by Rothschild and the Gifted Group. World Series Cycling (WSC) plans to generate close to 39 million Euro by 2017, from an initial 17 million in 2013. The cash flow is centred around television and media contracts and incomes generated from centralising media and sponsorship deals.

Under the WSC proposal there would be a 64 per cent share hold or stake held by the 14 teams, giving each team, or franchise, 4.6 per cent. The franchises would invest 3.5 million Euro, or 250,000 Euro each, with 550,000 coming from Gifted and a major stake of 20 million Euro from Rothschild.

Each year participating teams would receive a guaranteed 1.5 million Euro as well as a dividend of the annual stream of revenue from media and television rights.

Finally, the proposal theoretically envisages profits amassing 85 Euro million within five years, with the total project worth 330 million by that point.

The UCI's proposal would have profits from the new races re-invested into the sport and distributed among teams, McQuaid said.