BEIJING, May 26 /PRNewswire-Asia/ -- QSL Sports Limited (QSL) is pleased to announce its six -year exclusive partnership with an extension option for another six years with the Chinese Baseball Association (CBA) to develop the China Baseball League (CBL), the only official professional baseball league in China. This is QSL's latest expansion to the sport following its investment in the China Youth Baseball League (CYBL) announced in June last year.
Mr. Kenneth Jian Hua HUANG, founder and chairman of QSL, and Mr. LEI Jun, chairman of CBA, will jointly lead the CBL as co-Chairmen to promote, reform and manage CBL. The partnership aims to spearhead the drive to raise China's profile and standards in the sport in the region, and eventually establish China as a key player in the international baseball arena. This year's CBL will be held from 12 July to 29 August in seven cities. They are Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Wuxi, Zhengzhou, Guangzhou and Chengdu.
Commenting on the partnership, Mr. HUANG said, "I believe the partnership between QSL and CBL will bring forward transformational changes to the sport of baseball in China. In the coming six years, we aim to create an Asian baseball league between China, Taiwan, Japan and Korea, most of whom have long been strong baseball league players on the world stage."
To achieve that, QSL will first promote the interaction between the players and coaches of these countries through better communication and staging playoff matches. The company's next step will be to invite professional teams from Taiwan, Japan and Korea to come to China for exhibition or invitational matches. Ultimately the company hopes to be able to create a set of game rules and prize money system for this Asian baseball league through collaboration and discussion.
QSL is a private company owned by HUANG. It serves as an investment platform to capture business opportunities in sports in China. Dr Yang, Executive Vice President of Franklin Templeton Investments, became partner of HUANG last month to jointly promote the company's sports-related investment. In February this year, QSL obtained an eight-year exclusive management rights of the National Basketball League (NBL) with the central government with an extension option for another eight years to promote, reform and manage NBL in collaboration with the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA).
