Having had the first kick, Satyam is raring to go for the goal now. With multi-million Fifa World Cup deal in its pocket, it is bullish on the growing business opportunities in sports and is expecting $100-million revenues through this vertical by 2010. The company has participated in the bidding process of 2010 Commonwealth Games and 2016 Olympics apart from many other sporting events to improvise the user/audience experience in viewership and broadcasting using IT.
Satyam had bagged two deals from the football governing body in July to custom-develop event management and logistics software for World Cup 2010 to be held in South Africa, Fifa World Cup 2014 in Brazil and the two Fifa Confederations Cups, which fall within 2007-2014.
?Sport as a sector has gained a lot of focus. We have tools, methodologies and relationships to give a better experience to the audience,? says B Ramalinga Raju, Satyam founder and chairman. ?We are also looking at multiple contracts in Olympics for IT procurement and game management services. With the Fifa deal, we have two focuses ? one is to transform sporting event and the second is to develop football as an alternate game to cricket,? Raju explained.
Satyam?s move is in line with global IT majors showing special interest in sports such as IBM pitching for Wimbledon, Accenture for golf, Atos for Olympics.
Incidentally, Satyam is the first Indian company to sign up as a Fifa World Cup Sponsor and the task is to manage over 2,50,000 audience and 1,30,000 volunteers besides managing over $1-billion assets during the matches. It is the fourth company after Anheuser-Busch, McDonald?s and MTN to join the proposed six-member World Cup sponsor line-up under the football body?s commercial hierarchy.
According to Dilbagh Gill, head, sports vertical, ?We see a lot of opportunity in distribution of content to improve the user experience. Currently, we are in talks with 15-20 broadcast channels that will air the World Cup matches of 2010 and 2014.? The company will provide end-to-end solutions, including IT infrastructure, web application support, transportation management, content management, distribution, space and material management systems.
?Around 216 television channels have lined up to secure broadcasting rights for the Fifa events,” Gill said. Satyam may help broadcasting companies with software and graphics applications at the time of the events. It is learnt that the Fifa World Cup 2006 had more than 76,000 hours of coverage over 376 channels worldwide, reaching a cumulative audience of over 26 billion viewers.
Apart from business, another interesting USP of sports vertical, is to attract talent for developing game management and new media solutions. The company also plans to encourage college and school students to practice football tournaments.