adidas breaks off its nine-year long partnership with rapper Kanye West, a.k.a Ye

adidas has announced that it is bringing its nine-year long partnership with Kanye, a.k.a Ye, to an end over alleged hate speech and anti-Semitic outbursts on Twitter. The brand also said that it is ending the production of Yeezy branded products and has stopped all payments to the rapper.

According to adidas, “This is expected to have a short-term negative impact of up to €250 million on the company’s net income in 2022 given the high seasonality of the fourth quarter.”

Moreover, Instagram and Twitter have also suspended Ye’s account owing to his anti-Semitic remarks and his other business partnerships have also come under scrutiny.

Since 2013, when the business signed his brand away from its competitor- Nike, adidas has collaborated with Ye and referred to it as "the most important alliance ever forged between a non-athlete and an athletic brand."

However, the ‘partnership came under review’ in the first half of October when Ye showed up wearing a ‘White Lives Matter’ t-shirt at Paris Fashion Week and also accused the company of ‘stealing’ his designs.

The phrase ‘Black Lives Matter’ gained prominence after the demise of George Floyd who was killed by a police officer in Minneapolis in 2020, which later became a political and social movement to highlight the racism experienced by black people, especially police brutality and racially motivated violence.

The German sportswear brand in a statement also mentioned, “adidas does not tolerate antisemitism and any other sort of hate speech. Ye’s recent comments and actions have been unacceptable, hateful and dangerous, and they violate the company’s values of diversity and inclusion, mutual respect and fairness.”

“After a thorough review, the company has taken the decision to terminate the partnership with Ye immediately, end production of Yeezy branded products and stop all payments to Ye and his companies. adidas will stop the adidas Yeezy business with immediate effect,” the statement further read.

During the nearly-decade long partnership between West and adidas, the company, on many occasions, has stated that the Yeezy brand collaboration with Ye was one of the most successful in the company's history.

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