Extreme E makes David Gillett head of media rights

Extreme E has made David Gillett its head of media rights.

Gillett arrives after recently spending three years between 2018 and 2021 with IMG looking after the FIA World Rallycross rights, before a year as commercial and marketing director at the Spa racecourse and just over half a year as event director for World Rallycross.

Gillet also spent 11 years from 2006 to 2017 in F1’s media rights team, and over a year with Pitch International, working on behalf of the Mercedes-AMG Petronas Formula One Team.

At Extreme E, Gillett will be responsible for negotiating and maintaining current broadcasters as well as delivering new partnerships. Extreme E has a broad strategy to media rights, with the BBC, ITV, Sky Sports, and BT Sport all showing races in the UK, and a docuseries on Prime Video.

He will be working alongside former IMG Motorsport colleague James Taylor, who joined Extreme E at its inception in May 2019 and is now chief championship officer. Taylor previously worked as IMG’s Vice President for the FIA World Rallycross Championship, where he was responsible for managing the IMG Rallycross team and overseeing the series’ partners and venues.

Aurora handles production for Extreme E’s broadcasts - which recently won Sport Production of the Year at the Broadcast Sport Awards and Remote Production of the year at the Broadcast Tech Innovation Awards.

Gillett said: “Extreme E has created a unique and thrilling motorsport package, which is like Mad Max meets Blue Planet. The only series which features the top male and female off-roaders going head to head in the same format; remote locations which provide a stunning backdrop to short, sharp wheel-to-wheel racing which goes right to the line; all wrapped up with hugely positive purpose – a race for the planet which raises awareness for e-mobility and climate issues.

“Our TV coverage is crucial in giving fans a front row seat to the action, as they can’t join in person for races. As a lifelong motorsport fan, I could not ask for a better opportunity than to be part of the team which gets to make this groundbreaking new motorsport as accessible as possible for everybody to watch, wherever they live in the world, and help it grow its audience base. I can’t wait to get stuck in.”

Extreme E chief marketing officer Ali Russell added: “David Gillett is hugely talented, and I am delighted that he has joined us at Extreme E. We have an impressive team here which is vastly experienced across all forms of motorsport, and beyond. We are all passionate about creating a motorsport which has real purpose and are certainly enjoying the journey as we continue to explore new ways to make this unique series famous.”