Sprinter Usain Bolt has extended his sponsorship deal with Puma, Europe’s second-largest sporting-goods maker, until the end of 2013 in what has been reported as the most-lucrative endorsement ever for a track and field athlete. Marketing experts estimate the deal will earn Bolt at least $15 million over three years, a figure that would eclipse what is thought to be the biggest current deal involving an athlete – Russian pole vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva’s five-year deal with Li Ning, worth $1.5 million per year. — Sports Business

Organizers of the London 2012 Olympics are close to reaching their domestic sponsorship target of 700 million pounds ($1.1 billion), the committee’s chairman said today exactly two years before the Games open. “We’ve raised well north of 600 million pounds,” Sebastian Coe, chairman of the London Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games, said in an interview at the Olympic site in east London. “We’re very pleased with that, as it’s in the teeth of a really difficult economic environment, and all that money is discretionary spending.” As Coe spoke, British four-time Olympic track cycling champion Chris Hoy rode his bike on a makeshift track in the 100 million-pound Olympic velodrome that will be finished early next year. — Bloomberg

With two years to go to the London 2012 Olympic Games, about 700 million pounds ($1.1 billion) of contracts are available for small companies, Lloyds Banking Group Plc said. “Down the supply chain, there are still a lot of opportunities,” Chris Daniels, head of the bank’s London 2012 business team, said in an interview. “A little less than 700 million pounds is still up for grabs.” There are contracts available for companies from all over the country, in sectors as varied as human resources, artistic performance, sports equipment, security, retail and merchandising, Daniels said. — Bloomberg

Dow Chemical Co., the world’s second-largest chemical maker, agreed to become a worldwide sponsor of the Olympics through 2020 to gain construction sales in host cities and boost brand awareness in emerging markets. Dow will be the official chemical company of the Olympics for the next decade in a partnership with the International Olympic Committee, the Midland, Michigan-based company said today in a statement. Terms of the sponsorship weren’t disclosed. Dow’s sponsorship makes a total of 10 companies paying an average of $90 million each for the four-year cycle ending in 2014, Gerhard Heiberg, chairman of the IOC’s Marketing Commission, said today in an interview in New York. Dow declined to say how much it will pay for its 10-year commitment. Other top-tier sponsors include General Electric Co. and Visa Inc. – Bloomberg