17th April, Hong Kong: For the first time since the ABF Tour became an official Tour of Asian Bowling Federation in 2004, an Official Partner, Alisports will be involved with six of the legs of the 2016 ABF Tour.

Alibaba Sports Group (Alisports), is a majority owned subsidiary of Alibaba Group Holding Limited (NYSE: BABA). Alibaba Sports Group will leverage the Alibaba platforms to integrate e-commerce, media, marketing, video, home entertainment, cloud computing and other internet-enabled technologies to form a sports platform that will participate in different aspects of the professional sports industry. This includes, but is not limited to, sports IP, sports media, events, ticketing and merchandising.

Alisports will take care of the TV production and media exposure through their media platform for 6 of the legs of the ABF Tour. The prize money for the top 4 bowlers in the Men and Women division respectively will be US$4,000 for each of the legs. Since 2004, Chinese Bowling Association has not joined the ABF Tour.

Because of the joint effort of Alisports and ABF, the China Open and the ABF Tour – China will be held in September in the same 24-lanes centre, Hao’s Bowling in Shanghai where the 52nd QubicaAMF Bowling World Cup will also be held there.

The six legs of the 2016 ABF Tour in which Alisports will be involved in are:

1. ABF Tour – Thailand, April 18, Bangkok
2. ABF Tour – Macau, June 27, Macau
3. ABF Tour – Chinese Taipei, July 10, Taichung, Chinese Taipei
4. ABF Tour – Hong Kong, July 18, Hong Kong
5. ABF Tour – China, October 13, Shanghai
6. ABF Tour – Indonesia, October 24, Jakarta

Asian Bowling Federation is most appreciative of Alisports’ interest in the sport of bowling and look forward to a long lasting partnership in the years to come. For further information and details, please contact ABF Tour Committee at Tel: +852 2893 6039, Fax: +852 2893 6290; Email: hktbc@netvigator.com.