Benfica Opens The Gate For Cryptocurrency

Portugal’s club S.L. Benfica, Primeira Liga champion for the 37th time this season, has become the first major European football club to accept cryptocurrency payments.

Partnering with solutions provider UTRUST, Benfica now gives its supporters the option to use cryptocurrency to purchase match tickets and the full range of merchandise through the official Benfica online store.

With more than 14 million supporters worldwide, and a global, digital fan base that exceeds seven million across social media platforms, Benfica will use cryptocurrency to help drive its evolving e-commerce strategy and expand its global audience.

The partnership with UTRUST, based in Braga in northern Portugal, will give Benfica access to a wider customer base and offer a significantly enhanced online experience through the implementation of novel technologies.

UTRUST’s core technology will allow Benfica to take advantage of the increased security and convenience of cryptocurrency payments while protecting the club from market volatility.

It will also significantly reduce processing fees and eliminate inconvenient credit-card chargebacks and fraudulent payments.

Most importantly,  Benfica will be able to settle payments directly to its bank in fiat on the very same day they are received.

For supporters, paying with cryptocurrency is cheaper, safer and faster than any other online payment method.

With the UTRUST platform, users can pay using the native UTRUST token (UTK) in addition to popular cryptocurrencies Bitcoin and Ethereum.

The official Benfica online store has already begun accepting cryptocurrency and supporters can purchase tickets, clothing and all other merchandise via Benfica’s desktop website, mobile or dedicated app

S.L. Benfica CEO Domingos Soares de Oliveira said: “This is an exciting day in the history of S.L. Benfica as we announce our decision to accept cryptocurrency payments. Our benfiquistas make Benfica the unique and special club that it is, and we recognize that many of our supporters are now digital users first, so we want to be ahead of the curve when it comes to adopting novel technologies and giving our supporters the best online experience.”

“We are very excited about the possibilities that this partnership with UTRUST presents in the evolution of our e-commerce strategy and we look forward to accepting our first cryptocurrency payment.”

UTRUST Co-Founder and CEO Nuno Correia said: “This partnership with Portugal’s number one football club marks a major milestone for UTRUST and the blockchain ecosystem as a whole. Benfica is one of the biggest sporting clubs worldwide and we are delighted to be making cryptocurrency payments possible for their 14 million supporters around the world.”

Gatorade Launches App For User-Generated Content

Gatorade has launched a new mobile product to help athletes capture and elevate their individual sports accomplishments.

Available for both iOS and Android, the free Gatorade Highlights app enables video capture and editing features, so that users can easily share their high-quality content across social channels or through email and text message.

Users can create broadcast-quality video clips with graphics and “motion stickers” that move with the action in the videos, letting athletes point out key moments in the clips.

Digital agency World & Co led strategy, branding, design, and development of the new platform.

The move comes as Gatorade focuses on digital innovation and invests in new ways to connect with athletes.

“Young athletes are increasingly searching for ways to showcase their unique skills and distinct identities, and then share them with the world,” said Work & Co Associate Partner Caleb Yarian. “That insight became the strategic foundation for Gatorade Highlights – building a digital platform that fuels athlete individuality.”

Steve Tew Will Step Down As All Blacks CEO At End Of Year

Steve Tew will step down as New Zealand Rugby CEO at the end of 2019 after a 12-year tenure highlighted by four World Cup titles and a massive increase in revenues.

Tew, appointed in 2007, restructured NZR into a commercial juggernaut that has helped deliver the last two World Cups for the All Blacks and two of the last three titles for the women’s Black Ferns.

Reuters reports:

He will hope to sign out with a fifth World Cup triumph when the All Blacks bid for an unprecedented hat-trick in Japan from September.

“I’ve always been a great advocate for challenging convention and keeping New Zealand Rugby fresh and invigorated, whilst always encouraging our people to grow and extend themselves,” said Tew.

“I believe the time is right for someone else to lead the organisation.

“It has been a great privilege to hold this position and I’m grateful for every day that I have experienced.”

Under his stewardship, NZR maintained rugby’s dominance in the South Pacific nation while delivering global silverware despite a tough policy on players’ eligibility.

Barring a handful of exceptions, overseas-based players are ineligible to play for the All Blacks but the strength of the country’s talent pathways and coaching has mitigated the player drain.

New Zealand’s Super Rugby teams have claimed six of the last seven championships in the mainly southern hemisphere competition, with the Canterbury Crusaders favoured to win a third in succession in coming weeks.

It has not all been plain sailing.

The former Canterbury CEO had to announce a record NZ$15.9 million ($10.5 million) loss for 2009 after investments went sour amid the global financial crisis.

NZR also came under fire in 2016 over its handling of assault allegations from a stripper hired by Waikato Chiefs players during their end-of-season celebrations.

The organisation has proved flawless at running major events, however, with Tew overseeing New Zealand’s successful hosting of the men’s 2011 World Cup and the lucrative British and Irish Lions tour in 2017.

Having successfully steered New Zealand’s winning bid for the 2021 women’s World Cup, Tew has been touted for a senior role at World Rugby but he said he had no plans beyond finishing up in December.

“I’ll sit back, take a deep breath and look at what the options are,” he said.

The next CEO will have “daunting shoes to fill,” World Rugby CEO Brett Gosper wrote on social media.

“Staggering on field achievements and outstanding commercial and brand victories off it,” he tweeted.

“He fought ferociously for what was right for @NZRugby but also championed what was right for @WorldRugby.”

W Series CEO Catherine Muir Bond: “Changing The Face Of Motorsport”

As the W Series, the first all-female motor racing competition, heads into its third race of its first season this coming weekend in Misano, Italy, iSportconnect TV presents an exclusive interview on iSportconnect TV with W Series CEO Catherine Bond Muir.

The W Series, which has the ambition of opening up motorsport to female drivers, features 18 drivers from 13 countries in this first season, which started at Hockenheim, Germany on May 4 and finishes at Brands Hatch on August 11.

One of season one’s biggest story so far happened off the track in late May when W Series announced a new partnership with NBC Sports to broadcast the inaugural season across the U.S.

In the UK, Channel 4 is showing all six W Series races live.

Catherine was an intellectual property solicitor who specialised in sport before moving into corporate finance, where she spent over a decade working on sports and gaming M&A deals and IPOs.  These included the sale of Chelsea Football Club to Roman Abramovich and the acquisition of Aston Villa by Randy Lerner.

As she tells it herself, “W Series started its life at my dining room table as I was looking for a new venture after taking a career break for my only child who I gave birth to at age 45.”

“Three years on, I’m surrounded by the most talented team making this dream happen.”

This week, W Series named WWE veteran Tracey Keenan as Chief Commercial Officer. See more here.

 

Liga ACB Picks Protocol Sports For Asian Distribution

Spain’s basketball Asociación de Clubes de Baloncesto (ACB) has selected Protocol Sports Marketing to to market and distribute the television, digital and streaming rights to Liga ACB, Copa del Rey, Supercup and its associated media properties to select territories in Asia and Eurasia.

The Liga ACB (also known as Liga Endesa) is widely considered, alongside the National Basketball Association and the Euro League, to be among the top three basketball leagues in the world.

Featuring 18 teams, including world class franchises Real Madrid and Barcelona, Liga ACB’s competitive balance benefits from a promotion and relegation system, with the two lowest-placed teams each year being relegated to Spain’s LEB Oro League, and the top teams from LEB Oro promoted each year to Liga ACB.

Toronto-based Protocol Sports will market Liga ACB media assets, including up to 68 regular-season games, the various play-offs, the Copa del Rey tournament and a weekly magazine show.

“We are very impressed with Protocol Sports Marketing and its legacy of working hard to deliver meaningful prospects for its right holder partners,” said Joan Manuel Carreras, ACB’s Director of International Development.  “With Liga ACB at the forefront of basketball’s progression all around the world, we are confident that Protocol Sports can deliver new opportunities for Liga ACB.”

“Protocol Sports will never relinquish its role to work with fragmented, niche and emerging sports, but this deal offers a wonderful chance to market internationally an historically-significant property such as Liga ACB,” said Protocol Sports CEO J. Gary Gladman.  “We are so pleased to have concluded this deal with ACB, and my entire team looks forward to providing significant and long-lasting opportunities for Liga ACB.”

PGA Tour Adds First Bermuda Tournament

The PGA TOUR is adding the island of Bermuda to its 2019-20 schedule with the newly announced Bermuda Championship, to be played the same week as the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions.

Officials from the Bermuda Tourism Authority, the official destination marketing organization for the island, and the PGA TOUR announced the tournament during a press conference yesterday at Port Royal Golf Course in Bermuda.

With competition scheduled for October 31-November 3, 2019, the Bermuda Championship represents the PGA TOUR’s first official annual event on the island.

Bermuda Tourism Authority has signed a five-year agreement, through 2023, as the title sponsor. The tournament, with an anticipated field of 120 professionals, will carry a purse of $3 million and offer 300 FedExCup points to the champion.

“We are excited to add the Bermuda Championship to the PGA TOUR beginning next season,” said Ty Votaw, Executive Vice President, International for the PGA TOUR.

“Bermuda is an appealing year-round destination, and the players will love visiting in the fall, plus we will be hosted by an outstanding golf course. It promises to be a wonderful opportunity to showcase Bermuda – a beautiful island destination that embodies genuine hospitality – to the world.”

“The Bermuda Tourism Authority is thrilled to have secured this pinnacle event in golf for Bermuda’s tourism industry and community,” said Kevin Dallas, CEO of the Bermuda Tourism Authority.

“We’ve had our sights set on a PGA TOUR partnership because of the significant economic benefit the event itself will generate for Bermuda’s economy as well as the worldwide exposure to their audience that perfectly aligns with Bermuda’s visitor targets.”

MLS Commissioner Garber: “We Have Earned International Respect”

Major League Soccer, once shunned by the international football community, is gaining respect thanks to its steady growth in popularity and new stadium projects, Commissioner Don Garber said.

Reuters reports:

The MLS got off to a rough start following its debut season in 1996, bleeding money in its early years as it struggled to attract fans in a North American sports market dominated by American football, basketball and baseball.

But after its initial growing pains, it began to find its audience with attendances averaging more than 22,000 fans per game last season, a league record.

MLS is set to expand to 30 teams in the coming years with seven soccer-specific stadium projects planned, giving the league legitimacy on a level Garber never dreamed of.

“Years ago the international football community barely acknowledged that we existed let alone rated us as having any sense that we knew what we were doing,” Garber told reporters ahead of the unveiling of the Portland Timbers’ newly-renovated stadium.

“And that was from (governing bodies) FIFA to UEFA to U.S. Soccer to CONCACAF.”

“Over time that has shifted. There really has been a generational movement on the development of the soccer culture,” said Garber, who took on his role in 1999 when many predicted the league was destined for failure.

“We finally are creating this idea that the United States and Canada can be a place that can be really good for the development for all aspects of the game.

“So it’s a good time to be in the soccer business.”

That business includes an $85-million upgrade to Providence Park, a 25,000 capacity stadium that opened its doors to a raucous sold-out crowd on a warm night in Portland, which calls itself “Soccer City USA”.

New stadiums are currently planned in Miami, Cincinnati, Columbus, Austin, Nashville, Sacramento and St. Louis.

“The arc of stadium development over the last 20 years has been remarkable, but I think it follows the arc of the development of the league,” Garber said.

Garber said one virtue of the MLS is that at the start of the season, any team can win the MLS Cup due to its salary cap system, which helps keep a level playing field that has produced 10 different MLS Cup champions over the last 12 seasons.

Now that he has the ear of the international soccer community, Garber warned European governing body UEFA against its plans for a Super League, which would replace the Champions League with a competition that would cater to Europe’s top clubs and be largely closed to outsiders.

“It would have a negative effect on every other team in Europe and it would be really good for those top 12 teams,” said Garber, who sits on the football stakeholder committee of world governing body FIFA and is the co-chairman of the World Leagues Forum.

“So I am not a fan of the Super League. I don’t think it serves the leagues well. I think it serves a handful of teams well.”

Garber said his goal is to continue to grow MLS “brick by brick” in North America until it is considered among the world’s best in terms of quality, the passion of its fans and the economic value of its franchises.

“Portland is a fantastic example of what MLS can deliver,” he said of the Timbers, who have sold out every game since they joined the league in 2011.

“The momentum is going to continue.”

 

Olympics TV Rights Move To New Korean Partner From 2026

Subscription platform JTBC has been awarded the media rights for the Olympic Games from 2026 to 2032 for South Korea and North Korea.

The announcement was made at a signing ceremony attended by IOC President Thomas Bach and Hong Jeongdo, the President and CEO of JTBC, at the Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland.

The agreement follows the conclusion of a competitive tender conducted by the IOC.

The deal brings to end the control of Olympic media rights by the Korea Pool of terrestrial networks SBS, MBC and KBS.

SBS aholds the Olympic broadcast rights from 2018 through the Paris 2024 Games,

JTBC has acquired the rights across all media platforms, with a commitment to provide broad coverage across the organisation’s linear, digital and social media platforms.

The agreement includes guarantees that at least 200 hours of Olympic Games and 100 hours of Olympic Winter Games coverage will be broadcast on national coverage television channels.

In addition, JTBC will support the IOC and the Olympic Channel on a year-round basis to engage with future generations and promote sport and the Olympic values on digital platforms.

LaLiga Clubs Target Asia-Pacific Region For Growth

Establishing an international presence for football clubs has a series of positive long-term effects, from commanding a larger TV audience to creating new overseas partnerships, leading to the creation of jobs and income as well as increased sporting opportunities around the world.

In Spain, internationalisation has become a central part of many clubs’ strategies. But rather than driving clubs it apart, it is bringing clubs together as they combine best practice and resources to give themselves the best chance of success.

At the recent World Football Summit Asia, directors from FC Barcelona, Valencia CF, Sevilla FC and SD Eibar discussed how approaching global markets in a collaborative manner, alongside LaLiga, is building strong foundations for the future.

With interest in football growing rapidly across the continent, Asia has emerged as a top priority for clubs looking to make their mark internationally.

“For me, the opportunities are in Asia, the future is in Asia, the present is in Asia,” said Jordi Camps, Managing Director for FC Barcelona in the Asia-Pacific region.

“Europe is a mature market. The United States is a very competitive market. South America is a tough market. In Asia, that’s where the opportunity lies.”

Eduardo Valdés, SD Eibar’s International Business Development Manager, is also very interested in the continent as has seen his club become the third-most watched team in Japan after Barcelona and Real Madrid, helped by the presence of Japan international Takashi Inui, who played for them between 2015 and 2018.

Yet the Basque club’s success in the region wasn’t just down to having a player from an Asian country. “Inui has left, so we lost our main player of interest in Japan, but we had a plan for this all along. We have invested more resources and more money into the country this season to try to be as close as possible to our Japanese audience.”

“Our first commercial deal was signed after Inui departed. We want to make clear to our local fans that all the work we had done over the past three years is not done.”

Read the whole story in Global Fútbol.

Discovery Ups Investment In Streaming Platform FloSports

Live sports streaming service FloSports said yesterday that it raised $47 million from investors including current partner Discovery Inc. to grow its coverage of new and existing sports.

Other current investors that participated included Causeway Media Partners LP, Fertitta Capital and DCM Ventures. Strategic investors included World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. and Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments, a unit of Bertelsmann SE & Co KGaA.

Reuters reports:

FloSports launched in 2009 to concentrate on marginalized sports that were not covered regularly or deeply in traditional media, particularly track and field and wrestling.

It tapped into fans’ passion for the sports they played and expanded to cover more than 20 sports, including soccer, basketball, volleyball, rodeo, bowling, softball, cycling, cheerleading, weightlifting and ballroom dance.

With the new round of funding, “we will further enrich underserved sports communities by broadening our existing coverage and expanding into new verticals,” said FloSports CEO and co-founder Mark Floreani in a statement.

Last year the firm inked or extended at least 250 media rights deals, boosting the number of games available to watch in some underserved sports and creating content about key matches and star athletes.

Last month the Colonial Athletic Association signed a four-year, seven-figure partnership for FloSports to cover the league’s 22 sports, the first time any collegiate conference selected a direct-to-consumer streaming service as its primary media partner.

FloSports’ subscriber numbers and annual recurring revenue have both grown by more than 50 percent year over year.

Net subscriber growth through the first quarter of 2019 was greater than all subscriber growth in 2018, the company said.

FloSports has a library of 2,000+ hours of content and owns exclusive broadcast rights to 4,000+ events, with over 1 million hours live streamed since inception. The company has 250 employees and is based in Austin, Texas