Genius Sports: Sublicensing Betting Data Rights for Premier League

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The deal with Football DataCo was announced on May 9, 2019. Genius Sports is going to become the official supplier of the live data of Premier League, English Football League, and Scottish Professional Football League competitions. This news wisely circulates the media – indeed, this deal is an important sign of the changes taking place in the sports betting industry around the world.

Genius Sports is not a new company, although it was established only in 2016. This entity was created as a result of a merger between SportingPulse International and Betgenius. Before that, SportingPulse had been famous for software and sports data businesses, while Betgenius – for technology support and data supply for the betting industry. Having formed Genius Sports, both companies set to provide what they call integrity services and data management to major sports leagues.

Implementing this strategy, this company aimed at further mergers and acquisitions. In 2017, a volleyball technology provider Data Project was acquired by Genius Sports. Later on, in 2018, Apax Partners, in turn, acquired Genius Sports. This way Genius Sports became a part of the oldest and largest private equity firms operating worldwide.

This is exactly what happened: fast-growing and actively developing company providing data management and diverse support services, including betting for major sports leagues, is now a part of a global private entity firm officially ranked 14th in the list of the largest global players on the private equity market.

While there is no doubt that sports betting has become a global business, now it is becoming increasingly integrated into the diversified global economy of our time. This economy is getting more and more digital by its very nature, based on the flows of data that are rapidly intensifying and going wider and wider every year. And the sports betting industry is getting its piece of the cake.

British football, extensively fanned and televised worldwide, is a very popular attraction and a powerful betting generator. While there still is a huge class difference among the competing teams, the results of the matches often hang by a thread. And the general opinion is that these results have become less predictable over the span of the several past decades.

With Genius Sports licensing the data supply related to the three most popular British football leagues, it will be interesting to see how further sublicensing deals would pan out. Every betting operator would choose a licensed data supplier to buy the data from. That is why there is a certain stir among the potential bidders, and betting operators are eagerly waiting for the outcomes.