N3XT Sports is dedicated to modernising the sports industry through digital transformation. Their mission is to maximise suppliers and partners’ ability to innovate independently while also offering strategic ideas that benefit the industry at large.
We caught up with the N3XT Sports team to learn more about their views on innovation and excitement of working with ThinkSport to help accelerate the digital growth of our entire network.
Can you share any recent advancements or projects that N3XT Sports is particularly proud of?
In the build-up to Paris 2024, we are working with multiple International Federations (IF) in the Olympic Movement, helping centralize their digital and data infrastructure while working to maximize fan engagement and optimize their internal operations.
Among them, since the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, N3XT Sports has supported United World Wrestling (UWW) on a multi-phase digital development strategy which has transformed the governing body into a digitally focused media house. As part of its digital roadmap, N3XT Sports oversaw the development and integration of UWW’s first-ever mobile app, video player, and customer relationship management (CRM) capability.
In 2023, our team then navigated the launch of the IF’s dedicated UWW+ over-the-top (OTT) streaming service, available via web and mobile, as well as a redesign of the UWW web page and single sign-on (SSO). The project opens up new commercial opportunities for UWW in the next Olympic cycle between Paris 2024 and LA 2028.
How does N3XT Sports collaborate with other organizations and stakeholders to drive innovation?
To continue innovating, we invest a lot of time and effort in ecosystem building. The benefits are twofold: while our partnerships help expand our internal learnings and knowledge base as a company, we also operate on the belief that the sector’s long-term growth rests on its ability to nurture healthy collaboration. Therefore, expanding our network is vital for connecting the industry through the power of digital transformation, and presents an attractive quality to organizations looking at the best ways to innovate.
As a company, we do not work on a “transactional” basis with our clients. Our business model is firmly built on collaboration, meaning that every project we work on is designed specifically to serve the client’s needs and long-term growth. To serve our clients and the industry at large, digital transformation requires understanding the inner workings of an organization and its barriers to innovation before deciding how technologies and strategy they should be adopting.
This extends to the collaboration and upskilling of the organization’s personnel, to better understand their needs, how innovation serves the employee, and to ensure that each project we undertake eventually gives independence & competency to the client’s workforce. In turn, developing the digital literacy of the people on the ground will equip the organization with the resources they need to be a positive force in the industry and become a benchmark for future innovation and collaboration.
Can you identify the most influential idea currently under development or exploration that, in your opinion, has the potential to redefine the future of sport?
Artificial intelligence (AI) is already being used throughout the sports industry, though how sports organizations leverage AI and machine learning models holds the capacity to dramatically shift how they ingest and manage large volumes of data, which has become the bedrock of the sector’s digitalization.
At N3XT Sports, we are proactively working with our clients on ways AI can be used to optimize their processes while increasing the quality and agility of their technology stacks. In response to this development, we have recently launched a new offering to our clients called N3XTAI, which makes data easier for their personnel to access and, in doing so, helps raise their productivity.
Whereas AI is often seen as a tool for measuring athlete performance and distributing generative video content online, AI functions will increasingly play an important role in analyzing fan data and user behaviors, in turn influencing the future of the fan experience, the customer relationship, and the next iterations of direct-to-consumer (D2C) technologies.