America’s Cup Teams Unite: What It Means for Global Sailing

In a significant milestone for global sailing, the iconic America’s Cup, the world’s oldest international sporting trophy, has entered a new era. The recently established America’s Cup Partnership (ACP) brings competing teams together under shared governance and commercial structure for the first time in the event’s 174-year history.

The foundation of the ACP was finalized this week with the Defender Emirates Team New Zealand (representing the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron) and the Challenger of Record Athena Racing (representing the Royal Yacht Squadron Ltd). The ACP will become operational on November 1, 2025, and teams must register by October 31 to participate in the Louis Vuitton 38th America’s Cup in Naples.

Under the new model, each team will hold a seat on the ACP board, which will oversee an independent management team dedicated to commercial growth, long-term investment in events and teams, continued technical innovation, and a more predictable competition cycle planned now to occur every two years.

Emirates Team New Zealand CEO Grant Dalton remarked, “The America’s Cup is the pinnacle of sailing with innovation and technology in its DNA for 174 years, but it has long been managed on an event-by-event basis without a structure to plan for the long-term. There is a huge amount of unrealized valuable IP and commercial value that is tied up in the technology of the teams as well as the event.”

Sir Ben Ainslie, CEO and Team Principal of Athena Racing, added: “The formation of ACP is a truly historic moment for the America’s Cup and has taken 12 months and cross-team collaboration to put in place. For the first time, teams are uniting not just as rivals on the water, but as shared stakeholders in its future.”

For cruising-minded sailors, the shift is notable. While the focus remains at the pinnacle of racing (the foiling AC75 monohulls) this governance change signals broader stability and innovation in the sport, which may influence down-the-line trickle-downs of technology, competition formats, and public engagement. The fact that teams will have a longer-term framework means better planning, potentially more events between Cups, and an elevated presence of high-performance sailing, which touches the cruising community by heightening the broader interest and accessibility of the sport.

As the nearest edition, the Louis Vuitton 38th America’s Cup in Naples approaches, the ACP’s formation sets a clear signal that the event intends not just to compete but to evolve sustainably, with shared governance, innovation and growth at its core.

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