Laliga, the Spanish soccer first division organization, has established a strategic partnership with Stadioplus and Vegas City Limited, two metaverse-related companies, to digitize part of its activities to offer new experiences in Decentraland, an Ethereum-based metaverse. With this move, Laliga aims to bring new fans from all over the world to new experiences in virtual worlds.
Spanish Laliga Preparing Metaverse Entrance
After the Covid-19 pandemic, many sports organizations and leagues around the world have started to pay more attention to their digital strategies as a way of opening new revenue streams. Laliga, the Spanish first division soccer organization, and one of the most renowned leagues in Europe, has recently announced its entrance into the metaverse.
The company established a strategic partnership that will allow it to feature activities and experiences in Decentraland, one of the first Ethereum-based metaverse platforms. For this task, the company will leverage the aid of Stadioplus, a group dedicated to linking the world of sports with Web3 and the metaverse, and also Vegas City Limited, another company that specializes in creating experiences for metaverse and virtual worlds.
With this move, Laliga hopes to reach new and younger audiences that are more linked to these worlds through virtual experiences. The new experiences will be offered in a set of parcels in Vegas City, a region of Decentraland that houses sports, gaming, and entertainment based experiences.
About the partnership, Stephen Ibbotson, head of franchises and licensing at Laliga, stated:
For LaLiga it is essential to continue innovating in the ways of offering the best of the competition to our fans, both on and off the pitch. This license agreement will allow us to reach a new and relevant audience, such as Decentraland.
On the importance of the integration of sports into the metaverse, Agus Ferreira, CEO of the Decentraland Foundation, stated:
We believe that esports is an amazing opportunity to show the possibilities of web3 and decentralization. That is why we are delighted to work with Stadioplus on the inclusion of Laliga in Decentraland, to bring the competition, which has hundreds of millions of fans around the world, to the metaverse.
Spanish Soccer Teams and the Metaverse
Other Spanish teams have also presented different metaverse initiatives. FC Barcelona, one of the biggest teams in the league, launched Barca Studios, an entertainment-based division to centralize the development of its metaverse activities in March. Socios.com, a fan token company that had already partnered with the club before to launch of its fan token, invested $100 million in Barca Studios in August.
Also, FC Real Madrid, another team part of Laliga, filed a series of trademark applications to protect their IP for activities in the metaverse.
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