The prolonged contract means Infront, a Wanda Sports company, will remain the exclusive international media rights partner for all FIS World Cup events held in Germany for the next nine seasons.

The partnership extension comes ahead of time with the agreement originally set to run through to 2020-2021.

Around 25 FIS World Cup events take place in Germany each year across the disciplines of Alpine skiing, ski jumping, cross-country, Nordic combined and freestyle skiing.

It makes the country one of the key pillars of the FIS World Cup calendar.

The contract between the DSV and Infront covers international media rights for all the disciplines.

Among the stand-out events are the Four Hills ski jumping tournament in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and Oberstdorf, and biathlon's World Team Challenge in Gelsenkirchen.

The DSV will continue to independently market media rights for the German market.

"The extended agreement with our reliable partner Infront sets the German Ski Association on a good course for the upcoming years," Stefan Schwarzbach, DSV’s marketing chief executive, said.

"We are in the best possible position to continue developing our various disciplines and World Cup events successfully and with a future-orientated cross-federation strategy.

"Besides offering us economic planning security, the extended partnership with Infront also provides us with maximum flexibility to react in an appropriate and sustainable way to the various challenges of the elite sport as well as changes in media usage."

Bruno Marty, executive director of winter sports at Infront, added: "The extended deal means a lot to Infront.

"It demonstrates the level of trust between the two partners.

"The agreement originally ran through to 2020-2021.

"That the DSV has extended it so early to last through to 2025-2026 shows the strength of the partnership that we have built.

"Having this long-term agreement supports the continuing development of ski sport both in Germany and beyond, and represents a central element of Infront’s strong international ski media portfolio.

"It also gives plenty of scope to further extend the DSV’s use of digital platforms in covering these events, and presents exciting opportunities to bring fans closer to the action than ever before."

Infront has agreements with all but three of the National Ski Associations - Austria, Switzerland and Romania - that carry out FIS World Cup events worldwide.

It is claimed this enables Infront to market its FIS World Cup events on a collective basis, and thereby create maximum exposure for the sport around the globe.

The DSV last extended its partnership with Infront in May 2014.