Blockchain in Sports: Ready to Reap These Benefits?

From IoT to video analysis software, technology is reinventing the world of sports as we know it. Can blockchain, the hype about which continues with no signs of abating, add anything to that?

We think yes — in this post, we’ll outline the possible applications of blockchain in sports and the benefits that managers and teams can get out of them.

In a Bid to Boost Fan Engagement

Fans represent a major revenue stream for sport club and tournament owners, so providing them with a compelling experience should be a number-one task. What are the avenues toward driving fan engagement?

Sport teams and tournaments can harness the power of blockchain to introduce their own virtual currency — a foundation for a refined loyalty program. Fans would spend their tokens on tickets, food and beverages at stadiums, subscription services, and online shopping, as well as get an array of virtual bonuses that can be redeemed any time. And this is a step to improving operational efficiencies, which leads to more money in the bank.

Besides, blockchain can expand its application to enabling peer-to-peer ticket exchange. By adopting such a solution, clubs will not only engage fans but also make the ticket market more transparent — putting an end to fake ticket sales.

Steps to Getting Rid of Doping Scandals

The 2016 Rio Olympics saw a number of doping scandals, and Sharapova’s case still causes much talk. It stands to reason that doping is a great challenge for the sports industry. What can blockchain do in this regard?

This tech can become a foundation for creating a more extensive and secure network to store doping test results. How does the whole process look like? Data is put into the system to be checked for compliance with relevant medical and sports protocols. And once this medical data has been logged into blockchain, it can’t be changed.

As a result, federations can’t manipulate data as before, and hackers will have huge problems with accessing doping test results. That all allows making the world of sports much fairer.

On the Way to Facilitate Funding

If you’re not on the list of most famous and prosperous sports managers yet, you’ll probably be interested in the following application of blockchain.

As opposed to talent management agencies that have funds to promote just a few lucky ones, decentralized crowdfunding platforms based on blockchain make it possible to raise money for a greater number of novice athletes.

As one of the TokenStars investors puts it, “The more funding young athletes get, the more chances they have to improve their skills by gaining access to better equipment, a more qualified coach, a sports academy, and being able to travel to tournaments.”

Apart from financial support for aspiring athletes, blockchain can also be a basis for creating scouting platforms, thus fostering teams’ talent development.

Improving Athletes’ Performance

The sports industry is a treasure trove of valuable data, e.g. stats and athletes’ performance metrics. And this big data, namely the insights driven from its analysis, could give a sport team a significant leg-up. What’s the role of blockchain here?

This tech could serve as a reliable bank of data collected by IoT devices. The idea behind that is to log that data into ledgers and use it when AI-enabled analysis of particular sports metrics is needed.

This way, coupled with IoT and AI, blockchain could help coaches to fully understand athletes’ abilities and redefine their training plans to reach better performance and efficiency.

Ready to start?

After such a roundup of benefits that blockchain can give the sport industry, you have probably started thinking about a blockchain-enabled solution for your team. One way to build it is to use genEOS, a decentralized ecosystem for designing blockchain applications.

But mind the fact that it’s not easy from the technical point of view. To obtain real business value, you may need help from seasoned blockchain experts who have vast experience in developing decentralized apps. However, don’t be afraid of breaking the proverbial bank — with a newly built blockchain solution in place, you’ll get more bang for your buck.