On January 23rd, at the “Lo Sport Oltre Lo Sport” event, organized by Il Foglio Sportivo, N3XT Sports and Lega Pro announced a new collaboration between both entities. Through the collaboration, N3XT Sports becomes the Official Innovation Partner of Lega Pro and will support it in identifying the most relevant innovation platforms, technologies, and trends in the football industry.
Paolo Carito, Director of Strategic Development at Lega Pro talked about this partnership and what means to Lega Pro: “To compete within the Italian sports industry, Lega Pro needs to play the role of the innovator more than anyone else. In our continuous research for innovation we could not find anyone better than N3XT Sports: the partnership that came out is a natural consequence of the vision and mentality that we share. We recognize that the work done by N3XT Sports will allow us to clearly analyze the trends that characterize the sports system and we are looking forward to facing the challenges that will be presented to us. A special commendation should go to Lega Pro President Ghirelli who, more than anyone else, encourages us daily to seek the best solutions for Lega Pro and its associates.”
N3XT Sports, as a leading innovation consulting firm in sports innovation and sports technology, is happy to include Lega Pro in its Football Innovation Foresight program. N3XT Sports will provide a quarterly innovation report, several innovation workshops, and an innovation consulting service to all the Lega Pro Clubs. The main four innovation areas that N3XT Sports will cover are related to sport performance, smart venue, fan engagement, and new media/new sponsorship opportunities*
Both entities, N3XT Sports and Lega Pro, will partner with academic institutions, the names of which will be publicized throughout the life of our partnership, for academic and research support of the reports.
This type of partnership between a global sports consulting firm and a professional football league is the first one ever in European football.
Mounir Zok, CEO of N3XT Sports, highlights: ¨Partnering with one of the top football leagues in Europe provides us with an opportunity not only to continue to create massive value, but also to expand our scope in this disruptive, ever-changing landscape. We applaud Lega Pro for taking a proactive step to adopt a football innovation mindset, as we see this as key to staying competitive in the world of football and for the future sustainability of the industry. This partnership will allow us to provide insights to Lega Pro into the most relevant innovation platforms, technologies, and trends of the football industry, which will provide tremendous benefits both to N3XT Sports and Lega Pro¨.
About N3XT Sports: N3XT Sports is a sports consulting firm that specializes in innovation, technology & investment strategy. N3XT Sports works with international sporting organizations in football, basketball, and the Olympics, among others, to identify and address their most critical challenges, enabling them to achieve sustainable competitive advantage within the rapidly changing sports landscape. Born in the world’s epicenter of innovation in Silicon Valley, and headquartered in Barcelona.
About Lega Pro: Lega Italiana Calcio Professionistico was born as the third professional division of Italian football on 13 July, 1959. The structure and name of the league have changed several times over the course of its existence, establishing its present format as of the 2014-2015 season with the name “Lega Pro”. The league includes 60 teams distributed across all areas of the national territory, representing a strong social network for the continued development of the country. The league has a reach to 17 million fans, with the 60 teams competing in 1,140 regular season matches and 41 playoff matches, making Lega Pro one of the biggest sports leagues in the world.
*The specific areas and topics will be finalized on an ongoing basis in collaboration with all parties