An American-based multinational digital media company based in Miami has acquired the world-leading video archive from Duke Marketing.

TT films dating back to 1948 and World Championship motorcycle sports from the 1980s are at the heart of the giant collection.

Peter Duke, who launched Duke Video in 1981, said: ‘There is great strategic alignment between our content and Motorsport Network’s capacity to put our rich repository of content in front of millions more fans.

‘We’re also delighted as a company that Motorsport Network will give us a massive marketing boost to expand the volume, range and breadth of content that we produce.

‘We look forward to exciting opportunities to bring new products - including motorsport travel packages as well as collectable videos - to the market and dealing with new customers across the globe.’

The move builds on the recent announcement Motorsport Network and Motorsport.tv would feature the entire film history of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, underlining the company’s commitment to establishing an unrivalled motorsport film resource for fans around the world.

The Duke archive includes more than 1,500 titles and more than 2,500 hours of content including including rally, sports cars and touring cars, as well as an ‘unmatched pedigree’ in bike racing, with TT films dating back to 1948 and World Championship motorcycle sports from the 1980s at the heart of the collection.

Duke Video was founded in the Isle of Man and launched in 1981 by Peter Duke, son of six-time Isle of Man TT winner and six-time World Champion, Geoff Duke OBE.

The business is known internationally for its season review videos and has progressively migrated its formats from videotape to DVD and Blu-ray, and latterly digital download.