Sports business holds sturdy global pace; companies explore the segment for profits

Drifted by change, want, desire and demand, sports industry is one of the fastest growing businesses in today’s world. The consumer base may vary demographically and psycho-graphically, but with different verticals of the industry such as sports tourism, sporting goods (manufacturing and retail), sports apparel, professional sports, the demand is increasing with global market coming in unison.

One such firm which recently announced its new global sports unit is Vizrt. The formal expansion of the firm comes with an all-inclusive network of sport broadcasters, teams and federations, e-sports, and venues. Having an impressive client portfolio including Riot Games and Tencent, Vizrt has been considered as a strong partner in the industry, further justifying its global endeavors.

Dr Stephan W. Stadler who has been appointed as the Global Sports president, and to this CEO Michael Hallén said, “Creating a separate team with specialized skillset focusing the sports business follows recent years’ successful growth and will drive Vizrt’s expansion in sports even further… who better to lead than Stephan whose passion and knowledge about the sports broadcasting industry is unsurpassed.”

Stephan W. Stadler also added, “The dedicated global sports team will combine commercial sports and product excellence to even better support our worldwide client base in sports, which includes customers such as Star India, BBC Sports and Fox Sports.

Major companies have formerly come in collaboration with Vizrt, such as Infront Sports and Media (pioneering sports marketing company) to bring a virtual overlay solution to the customers, enabling the rights holders to provide unique marketing services, and streamlining the global commercialization of sports and related events. The growing virtual advertisement business will be under the umbrella of Vizrt Global Sports team, with its image-based overlay solution, Viz Eclipse, being a catalyst in driving the firm’s innovation.

Sports-tech is another area where the investments by venture capitalists is booming since 2012. Investments sport seed firms grew nearly 30% year over year. In 2015 alone, investors put over $1B into sports based startups, with the scope still accelerating.

Seeing the sports industry’s successful growth in recent years, the companies come forward to excavate profit-yielding opportunities.