Rolex
Rolex and the Australian Open
Rolex is Associate Sponsor and Official Timekeeper of the Australian Open 2012 and is particularly proud to be affiliated with the first Grand Slam tournament of the year.
The Australian Open follows close on the heels of the end-of-year holiday season and benefits from a jovial atmosphere. Players and fans alike are in a festive mood, leading Roger Federer to refer to it as the "happy slam".
Sponsorship of the Australian Open is part of Rolex's long and close relationship with tennis, which includes a 30-year association with The Wimbledon Championships. This commitment to tennis is further confirmed by partnerships with other major tournaments, such as:
- Davis Cup
- WTA Championships, Istanbul
- Barclays ATP World Tour Finals, London
- Sony Ericsson Open, Miami
- Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters
- Mutua Madrileña Masters Madrid
- Internazionali BNL d'Italia, Rome
- Rogers Cup (held alternately in Montreal and Toronto)
- Shanghai Rolex Masters
- BNP Paribas Masters, Paris
Rolex also supports the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, Rhode Island (USA), into which great players who have marked the history of tennis are inducted each year at a ceremony during the Campbell's Hall of Fame Tennis Championships.
Rolex is proud to have four high-ranking players among its Testimonees:
- Switzerland's Roger Federer, living legend of tennis with his record-breaking 16 Grand Slam victories on four different surfaces. Roger Federer furthermore won the men's doubles gold medal at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, partnered by Stanislas Wawrinka, and has four Australian Open titles to his credit, 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2010.
- China’s Li Na is changing the face of tennis in her country. After defeating defending champion Francesca Schiavone of Italy in the 2011 Roland Garros finals, Li made history by becoming the first player from an Asian nation to win a Grand Slam title. Her momentum started earlier that year when she reached a major singles final at the 2011 Australian Open – yet another first for an Asian player. Denmark's Caroline Wozniacki, number one in the world and already a tennis legend at only 20 years of age. She caught the public eye in 2006 when she won the prestigious Wimbledon Junior Championships and has taken but a few years to scale the ranks of world tennis, reaching the finals of the US Open in 2009 and wining six tournaments, including the China Open, in 2010.
Rolex is also associated with three other tennis champions: Serbia's Ana Ivanovic, France's Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, Argentina's Juan Martin del Potro and China's Zhen Jie.
Precision, skill, elegance and the pursuit of excellence have made Rolex and tennis perfect partners.