12 Jul DIGITAL UNLOCKS NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR SPORTS ENTITIES

Sports is just one of many industries that has been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic and that has started to progressively transform its processes in order to leverage on new opportunities.

Due to the many restrictions caused by the health crisis last year, this sector experienced significant losses: we saw the almost total shutdown of in-person activities, sports complexes and centres as well as of competition at all levels.

Estimates show that nearly a million sports-related jobs have been impacted in the EU, not only for sports professionals but also for those in related retail and sporting services such as travel, tourism, infrastructure, transportation, catering and media broadcasting, to name but a few. Additionally, Covid-related measures are estimated to have caused the loss of some €50 million in GDP across the EU-27. [1]

To keep pace with the industry’s disruption, more and more sports entities are embracing digital, a crucial safety net in 2020, and undoubtedly one of the most important drivers for growth.

The economic relevance of sport

Sport, in its different forms, is identified as driver for economic growth and it is embedded with sectors such as tourism, health and transport.

The global sports market is estimated at US$756 billion annually, with Europe responsible for US$250bn, the USA around US$420bn, and China, as one of the fastest growing markets, making up most of the difference (Smoggi, Value and Industry, 2020). With the last decade’s analysis, the trajectory of the global sport market seemed to be going only upwards.

Focusing solely on the EU, it is should be noted how the sport sector is comparable to forestry, fisheries and agriculture combined. Sport-related GDP equals 2.12% of the total GDP in the EU, or in other words, every 47th euro is generated by the sport sector. Moreover, employment in the EU sporting world combines around 5.76 million people, which equals to 2.72% of total EU employment. Specifically, every 37th EU employee works in the sport industry (EPSI, 2020). These calculations all demonstrate how sport generates great economic impact in many lucrative ways. [2]

E-payments support digital transformation in the sports industry

Innovation is driving growth more than ever in the sports industry.

Bringing digital transformation in the sports sector means dematerializing, optimizing and speeding up all activities, connecting the entire sports community and ensuring significant savings in time, costs and resources for the benefit of all players involved: administration teams, managers, coaches, athletes, families, fans and supporters, suppliers.

The health crisis has shown not only how crucial it is, even in this industry, to experiment more flexible organizational models, find new forms of fruition and offer of sports activities and consequently of revenue, but also how important it is today to offer online services and facilitate electronic payment methods.

Federazione Ginnastica d’Italia, Federazione Italiana Bocce, Centro Sportivo Italiano, Federazione Italiana Golf and Lega Nazionale Dilettanti are a few examples of sports entities that have adopted MyBank payment solution to successfully digitise their registration and membership processes.

By making MyBank solution available, sports organizations have facilitated online payments, providing families with an immediate, simple and secure solution directly from their internet banking, without no need for new registrations, passwords or accounts.

MyBank allows sports entities to offer an alternative payment tool and to collect payments without sharing any members’ sensitive data with third parties, in full compliance with GDPR (data protection and privacy), PSD2 (payment services) and AML (anti-money laundering) EU regulations.

Easy to integrate, MyBank represents for all sports sector players a valuable solution to digitise payment collection and, at the same time, streamline administrative processes: transactions via Bank allow 100% automatic reconciliation enabling organisations to eliminate complicated data matching, facilitating real-time knowledge of available financial resources and thus supporting their cash flow optimization.

Conclusions

Thanks to the disruptive evolution coming from digital transformation, sports organizations can lay the foundations for the future.

Digitising payments is key also for entities belonging to this sector and making use of secure and easy- to-use tools that are compliant with the most recent European regulations such as MyBank, represents a strategic differentiator, especially following such a difficult year as 2020.

Today, the sports eco-system can count on valuable digital tools to streamline their legal, accounting and regulatory requirements, to make their organizational and administrative activities more efficient, to dematerialize documentation and reduce bureaucracy, to better manage access to sports facilities and facilities, to have an up-to-date digital attendance register, to schedule competitions, training sessions, meetings and events and much more.

A 360-degree digital transformation is shaping the future of the sports industry, too.

 

[1] https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2021/659449/EPRS_BRI(2021)659449_EN.pdf

[2] The Impact of the Covid Crisis on the Sport Industry – Marbella International University Centre (miuc.org)