Gigaset-Bayern Munich deal

A new Bundesliga season means new sponsorship deals, which means new goodies for the respective football teams. Bayern Munich's players can expect a new mobile phone in their gift bag this season, but it is neither from Apple nor Samsung - it's from Gigaset.

The soccer stars may not be the only ones surprised by this choice. After all, few have ever seen a Gigaset cell phone. That's because the Munich-based company spent years producing cordless handsets. But next month, the company will unveil its first-ever smartphone at the upcoming consumer electronics show IFA in Berlin.

Gigaset is betting on Bayern to help make the smartphone a hit, hoping a little football star dust will work its magic on phone sales.

It's a risky bet, but Gigaset doesn't have much left to lose: Sales for cordless handsets are in free fall. Gigaset's profits have dropped by 3 percent to 143 million euros ($160 million) in the first half of 2015. The whole market has lost a tenth of its size in recent years.

"The company was forced to look for new areas of growth," Gigaset spokesman Stefan Zuber told DW. "We think we have found one with smartphones and we hope to generate some fresh growth for the Gigaset brand there."

The smartphone market is twice as big as that for cordless phones, and it is still growing. However, Gigaset could not have made the switch alone. "If we had been completely on our own, Gigaset, a small German company, would probably have been unable to cope," said Zuber. Chinese investor Goldin Group has supported the new project as the firm's majority stake owner.

The newly founded subsidiary Gigaset Mobile is a Chinese-German joint venture both financially and technologically. China is an important partner in the mobile phone industry. Companies such as Huawei, Xiaomi and Lenovo dominate the market alongside Apple and Samsung.

Even though the new devices are going to be manufactured in China, they will still be German products, Zuber insisted: "We will enter the market with a very good and high-quality product that carries the Gigaset DNA."

Despite falling revenues, Gigaset enjoys a strong reputation in the telecoms industry. Innovation is also key for the cordless phone market. 'Smarthome' is one of the new product lines developed by Gigaset. The design of some of its cordless devices is already very similar to smartphones. So, one for the home and one for the road - that's what Gigaset's product range could look like.

"It's our goal to connect the various product categories of Gigaset via the cloud in one ecosystem, so to speak," revealed Zuber. This includes alarm systems, motion detectors and surveillance cameras - all remotely controlled via mobile phones.

Yet, Zuber won't give away what the new smartphone will look like, which is expected to run Google's Android operating system. "We already have Android based devices for landline telecommunication, so we are experienced with smartphone-like interfaces", said Zuber.

He is sure the new phones will impress the likes of celebrity players Mario Götze and Thomas Müller, even though they're more used to top-of-the-line products such as the iPhone. Zuber does not want to put pressure on anyone to use a Gigaset phone, though. "What the players go for privately is their own decision."

Regardless of whether a Gigaset selfie by Mario Götze will help push sales, Zuber said he thinks the two companies are a match made in heaven. "Bayern Munich and Gigaset are coming together as two very traditional brands, both with roots in Munich." Gigaset once was a subsidiary of Munich-based engineering giant Siemens. Seven years on, it's ready to turn over a new leaf.

But Gigaset is not just betting on one horse. In fact, it's been supporting several - as a sponsor of the Royal Ascot horse races in the UK. But while the Munich stars and the British stallions appear to be a safe bet, Gigaset has yet to prove its mettle amid fierce competition.