DEPENDING on which football team you support, or indeed if football is your interest in the first place, last week saw the start of the Champions League and the return to European football to many of our homes.
This month saw the closure of the summer transfer window and the last opportunity of the year for the larger football clubs to spend a ludicrous sum of money on a player that could boost their chances of success and all obtain some of the big prize money up for grabs.
This time, there were few transfers to drum up hype for the new Premier League season – mainly because the money demanded for talented footballers today clashes with new administrative rules that prevent clubs from spending beyond their means. In other words, if football clubs want to be successful going forward, they have to run more efficiently like a normal business.
It’s for that reason, perhaps, that some of the biggest signings among England’s elite clubs this summer came less through £50 million purchases of 19-year-old boys – although some did still exist – and more in the form of technology partnerships.
First, City Football Group, which owns Manchester City, announced a global, multi-year marketing and technology partnership with German software firm SAP to simplify its operations, enhance fan engagement and transform the way its teams perform – from the boardroom to the pitch.
SAP's work with the German national team in the lead up to their victory at last year's World Cup no doubt convinced Manchester City of the company’s sporting credentials, and helped put pen to paper on a deal to implement a wide variety of cloud-based solutions across HR, finance and social.
Predictive analytics and business intelligence will be at the centre of the Manchester City’s new information infrastructure to analyse and simulate all data – helping make decision-making a faster and more informed process. City Football Group also owns New York City FC, Melbourne City FC and Yokohama F. Marinos in Japan.
Not to be outdone by their arch rivals, Manchester United announced in a press statement barely a few weeks following City Football Group’s, a digital transformation of their own – in partnership with HCL Technologies, one of India’s big six IT firms
Like City, United are keen to enhance the fan experience through a string of digital initiatives and will work with HCL Technologies to explore and unveil a number of digital initiatives to transform the experience of the club's 659 million global followers. They will also improve their website and mobile app as they prepare to launch a new digital media strategy next year. The two organisations will together, explore the latest in IT technology to increase ways in which supporters, sponsors and the club itself can develop a complete interactive fan experience.
Of course the level of significance that ICT has in football is shown clearly by the part it “plays” at its European headquarters. In the medium sized town of Nyon, on the northern shore of Lake Geneva in Switzerland and similar in population size to Banbridge (18,000), sit 45 core ICT staff, plus 35 contractors, who – as well as supporting UEFA’s 450 on-site staff – are tasked with running the technology that underpins the European organisation and governance of the world’s most popular sport. They manage a huge suite of computer programs called the Football Administration and Management Environment (FAME) and helps the core of UEFA’s work which has around 50,000 users, to function on a daily basis.
At this time of the season we often hear of enormous sums of money being invested in signing the next footballing talent to grace our screens and stadiums.
However, both clubs and administrators are now clearly seeing the benefits of investing heavily in their ICT systems and infrastructures for their future success both on and off the pitch.
- Trevor Bingham (editorial@ itfuel.com) is business relationship manager at ItFuel in Craigavon. Follow them on Twitter @itfuel.
