Editor's note: This story is part of The Athletic's coverage of SailGP, an international sailing competition which has been likened to Formula 1 on water. Follow SailGP here.

Sweden will be SailGP's new team next season after beating several other bids to secure the franchise for the expanding high-speed championship.

The team, bought outright by Swedish billionaire Torbjorn Tornqvist, will be known as Artemis SailGP.

As previously reported by The Athletic, it is thought the cost of owning a team outright exceeded $60million -- $55m more than the price of buying a franchise when the close-to-shore sailing championship started six years ago.

The Swedes will be led by two-time Olympic champion Iain Percy. As the team's CEO, the Englishman has appointed Nathan Outteridge, a fellow Olympian and America's Cup competitor, as the first member of the crew. The Australian will be the team's driver.

Speaking to The Athletic ahead of the announcement, Percy said his team was talking to sailors, their managers and current owners to fill the remaining spots on the six-person crew but warned: "It can't be an arms race."

"For me, it's one of the most exciting thing of this part of the sport, that we've genuinely got to the point like other sports where sailor contracts have value," he added. "Buying them out, driving them on. This is an incredibly positive sign.

"This wasn't the case a few years ago ... We're truly trading top sports people within sailing. I'll try to ruffle as few feathers as possible and still make it onto the podium as soon as possible."

Held from July to September, the tender process attracted 35 expressions of interests with "six or seven full bids," Andrew Thompson, SailGP's managing director, told a select group of journalists on Thursday, which included The Athletic.

Sweden was selected because SailGP felt the team would be competitive immediately, Thompson said. That Sweden was a huge market was another consideration.

Talks about changing the racing format to incorporate the new team are ongoing and a decision would be made within a month. Currently, all 12 national teams compete against each other during a seven-race weekend with a winner-takes-all finale on a Sunday between the top-three performing countries.

Thompson said teams could be split but insisted the championship was not considering introducing relegation or promotion. Ultimately, the championship would like to expand to 16 teams for even eight-team races.

"I certainly think you can run races with 13 teams, but there is a spectacle to be had with two groups of six and seven and what that also does is allow for more broadcast air time," Thompson said. "It's something we're discussing as a group now and we're factoring commercial considerations, sporting considerations, broadcast considerations."

Another new team, to compete from the 2027 season, will be announced later on in the year, Thompson said.

Interest in the championship has increased over the last two seasons in particular, with investment by high-profile sports stars and actors raising awareness.

Hollywood actors Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman became co-owners of the Australian team in June, while France's World Cup-winning striker Kylian Mbappe has purchased a stake in the French team.

Analysis by Andrew Rice

If any team can make waves in their first year on the SailGP circuit, it will be Artemis Racing.

Team boss Percy -- a three-time Olympic medallist for Great Britain -- has led America's Cup campaigns as far back as 2007 and has worked consistently with the owner of Artemis Racing since 2012.

Percy's first and, as yet, only sailing team appointment is Outteridge, an Australian double Olympic medallist who steered the Artemis Racing catamarans in the 2013 and 2017 editions of the America's Cup.

More importantly perhaps, Outteridge was one of the top performers in the first two seasons of SailGP as driver of the Japanese boat before Japan was replaced by a Canadian team. Outteridge has been looking for a way back into SailGP ever since.

Highly regarded as one of the best in the business, the 39-year-old's high-profile appointment could lure others away from the 12 existing teams.

Outteridge won his two Olympic medals alongside Iain Jensen. Could Jensen be tempted away from his current role as Great Britain's wingsail trimmer to join his old mate at the Swedish start-up?

Sweden named as SailGP's new team for 2026 season