Online fitness platform gains Beckett's expertise

Zwift recruits Steve Beckett to VP sales and marketing role

Zwift has further built on its team with the addition of Steve Beckett, the former Head of Cycling at Sky.

Beckett has previously managed Sky’s media planning and strategy, but since 2012 has been a consultant to the bike industry, working with teams, sponsors, event organisers and cycling federations.

“Joining ZWIFT is a unique opportunity. It ties together my career background to date and features all the elements I’ve been looking for in a new challenge” said Beckett. “We are going to be disruptive, in a good way, for cycling. ZWIFT is about getting more people on bikes, more often and having more fun. We will evolve the way industry brands can engage with participant audiences, and in doing so, we will strive to deliver greater communication and commercial returns to these stakeholders.”

For those unfamiliar with the Zwift platform, the virtual cycling world has successfully navigated a beta period and now offers a £10 per month subscription to its virtual training world, whereby riders can link up their turbo training with mimicked landscapes from around the globe. Anyone with a turbo trainer and an Ant+ sensor can get involved, riding with or against other users around the world. And it’s all Strava compatible, to boot.

For retailers, Zwift has plans to get you involved with in store demos using ‘Zwift stations’. To date there has been some 30,000 beta registrations and over one million miles logged by the community.

“In just the few months that we’ve been in Beta we’ve created an engaged and motivated community around the world.” said ZWIFT Co-Founder and CEO Eric Min. “Adding an experienced business leader like Steve to the team will help us in a number of ways. Steve has incredible experience at the junction of entertainment and cycling and we believe he’s exactly the right person to help us build a compelling and motivational experience that will capture the attention of a wide range of athletes.”

Back in December Zwift also added former Olypian Mike McCarthy to its staff.

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