Euroleague Basketball launches Digital Transformation Fund

Euroleague Basketball has launched a new Digital Transformation Fund aimed at supporting Turkish Airlines EuroLeague clubs in projects that allow them to undertake a step forward in their digital transformation journey.

The fund is intended to help clubs carry out projects that will have a positive financial impact and solve some of the current digital operational issues that they are facing. The initiative takes advantage of the work that the Euroleague Basketball Business Operations & Club Services (BOCS) has done to help clubs benefit from each other's experience by sharing best practices to maximize revenues and create long-term business sustainability.

Roser Queralto, Chief Business Officer at Euroleague Basketball, said: "We firmly believe that it is important to proactively work at helping the clubs grow their market revenues. That is why we created EuroLeague BOCS two years ago, which is a unit that is exclusively devoted to sharing information amongst the clubs, researching best practices in the world of sports and entertainment applicable to the EuroLeague, and developing league-wide and individual plans to grow the business in every vertical. With the launch of the DTF, we are further supporting our clubs in all their efforts to improve their business operations and develop a solid backbone for all of their internal-facing and fan-facing operations."

The fund, which will count on the expertise of N3XT Sports – a sports consulting firm specializing in innovation, technology and investment strategy – in its execution, will assist clubs in the development of projects in the field of data collection, data analysis, data monetization and game experience.

In preparation for the launch of the fund, clubs were evaluated for their individual readiness to modernize and improve their digital systems. Those who applied to participate submitted detailed projects that were analyzed by and will be carried out with the support of Euroleague Basketball and N3XT Sports.

Mounir Zok, CEO of N3XT Sports, said: "We looked closely at the efficiency and effectiveness of the clubs' operations, at their physical and digital fan-engagement products, we analyzed their data architecture and developed a league-wide assessment report to assist the clubs and the league in determining best next steps. This step is absolutely critical because it provides an objective view of the digital, data, and technology capabilities of each individual organization and helps them develop the most efficient and effective digital strategy. As DTF evolves, our aim is to help the clubs' structure innovation activities, embrace digital and data as key assets for making decisions and for engaging with a new generation of customers and partners."

Among the improvements that the clubs plan to put into action are customer relations management and fan loyalty programs meant to build closer relationships with supporters; mobile app development with the integration of third-party services; market research into fanbases, markets and business-to-business opportunities; ticketing and access control systems; development of partner activations; and cooperation with startups, to name a few.

The Digital Transformation Fund is a two-year project that 12 teams have joined to improve their knowledge of and relationship with their supporters through increased digital expertise that ultimately enhances the basketball experience of the future for the key stakeholders of the competition – the fans.