Blockchain in Sports and Esports

What are the Benefits of Blockchain in Sports and Esports?

• Enhancing fan interaction and experiences by incentivizing engagement

• Providing new revenue models through tokenized teams and enhanced loyalty programs

• Creating new markets for sports betting and collectibles trading

• Enabling athletes to crowdfund their performance using income share agreements or loyalty rewards

Facilitating the development of interoperable game collectibles, Consensys Sports is redefining how leagues, teams, athletes, and fans engage with each other.

What are the Blockchain Use Cases in Sports and eSports?

Enterprise Ethereum-based sports and esports enable the following use cases:

• Development of blockchain-based identities that give users benefits in exchange for providing insightful and actionable data to organizations.

• Incentivization and rewards for fan interactions – create better cross-partner loyalty programs that motivate fans to perform certain actions or buy certain goods

• Verification of memorabilia authenticity to reduce fraud and counterfeit items

• Design and production of the next generation of collectibles using digital infrastructure

• Creation of markets for gaming collectibles (i.e skins) trading as well as improvement in the tradeability of digital goods, skins, and in-game items.

• Capability for athletes to fund their own training in exchange for future income, loyalty programs, or other rewards

• Tokenized sports or esports teams that increase the liquidity of sports teams by enabling more investors to purchase shares or parts of organizations.

How will blockchain impact fan identity?

Creating blockchain-based identities unlocks new and meaningful experiences while creating unprecedented net value in the form of increased fan revenue, crowdfunding of assets, digital collectibles, and verifiable superfan stardom.

Think of a verifiable superfan as a fan profile or a sports organization issued a license. Sports organizations would be able to gather more insightful and actionable data about their fans in order to drive engagement and revenue.

How will blockchain impact incentivizing and rewarding fan interaction?

Blockchain-based loyalty reward programs can incentivize higher levels of engagement and provide real-time reward payouts and redemptions. Blockchain enhances loyalty rewards by creating a user identity across all digital touchpoints while also allowing for the trading of digital assets. For example, Ethereum enabled rewards programs can create cross-partner networks that allow loyalty rewards to be used with partnered brands.

How will blockchain impact memorabilia authentication?

The 5 billion dollar sports memorabilia industry is predicated on a system of trust to verify the authenticity of each specialty item. This dependency will end in the near future, as trained authenticators with magnifying glasses and discerning eyes are no match for immutable mathematics. Blockchain technology has the ability to grant individual pieces of memorabilia their own identities for authenticity and verification purposes.

How will blockchain impact digital collectibles?

Organizations will be able to generate and sell digital collectibles directly to their fans, providing a new way for fans to tangibly represent their event experience and participation.

What makes digital collectibles better than standard collectibles:

• Scarcity: Unique digital assets created in a limited quantity

• Trading: Tradable on an open market to engage owners and reach new users

• Verification: Authenticity can be verified, including the chain of ownership

• Reputation: Ownership demonstrates affinity, dedication, and expertise

How will blockchain impact gaming and esports?

Gaming and esports have emerged as a rapidly growing area of consumer interest, especially among millennials and generation z users. Blockchain-based games can be programmed with tokenized digital assets. These digital assets can be traded within a game or externally on the public market.

Blockchain technology can also create real-time sports betting with provably fair outcomes. Lastly, Ethereum enables the use of smart contract-based payouts which eliminates traditional intermediaries that take significant cuts.

How will blockchain impact athlete crowdfunding?

Athlete crowdfunding through personalized, automated contracts presents a new funding source that enables fan and community investment. Traditional financing typically requires an unfavorable loss of equity, cost of capital, or revenue to third parties. However, a crowdsourcing platform built with blockchain technology enables a league and its players to better monetize and track fan engagement and loyalty.

How will blockchain impact tokenization of teams?

Ethereum allows the public to buy shares in the team represented by tokens, opening ownership to the fanbase while directly raising funds without traditional corporate sponsors. Teams may fundraise to recruit talent, improve stadiums, or achieve other capital-intensive goals. This type of fundraising helps avoid margin loss to brokers and sponsors, while also offering a new level of community, integration, and monetization of the fanbase. Tokenized team shares can be bought and sold freely on an open market, increasing ownership liquidity for sports organizations. Token owners may have the ability to participate in the financial upside of organizations, stadiums, or individual sports teams.