Horst Dassler

Horst Dassler (12 March 1936 – 10 April 1987) was a German businessman, the son of Adolf Dassler, founder of the sportswear company Adidas and nephew of Puma founder, Rudolf Dassler.

He founded Arena, a swimwear company, and became chairman of Adidas in 1984. At the time of his death it was the world's largest sporting goods manufacturer, with affiliates in 40 nations. Horst was also known as the father of sports sponsorship as a result of his separate business of managing rights for the world governing bodies of football and the Olympics.

Career at Adidas

In 1960, Dassler joined Adidas, his father's firm, and founded an Adidas affiliate in Alsace that later became the dominant sporting goods manufacturer in France. Among Dassler's achievements was the founding of the Arena line of swimwear in 1973. Dassler had been impressed by the performance of Mark Spitz at the 1972 Munich Olympics. Having developed an ultra-light fabric, Dassler persuaded Australian swimmer Shane Gould to enter a sponsorship agreement to promote the Shane Gould Female Swimsuit Collection. Dassler continued to sign athletes to sponsorship deals and by the 1976 Montreal Olympics the "Arena Elite Team" included Mark Spitz, Novella Calligaris, Steve Furniss, David Wilkie, Shirley Babashoff, Gary Hall Sr., Klaus Dibiasi, Ulrika Knape, and Micki King. Beyond signing individual athletes, Dassler led Adidas's pioneering drive to sign national sports federations and Olympic committees to exclusive shoe and apparel contracts. Although Adidas lost a considerable share of this business after Dassler's death, even five years later Adidas had ties with about 100 companies.