IMG Arena, the betting arm of the international sports and entertainment giant, has today been appointed as the official fast betting data partner for 19 European soccer leagues and 44 competitions on the continent.
The division will “capture live game data in-stadia from over 8,500 matches a season” and will then distribute this information to hundreds of licensed sportsbook operators worldwide – in under one second, according to IMG.
The deal has been struck by IMG and European Leagues, the organization that represents the continent’s top domestic soccer leagues.
The deal covers competitions in top-tier European soccer nations including Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, and Portugal, as well as in second-tier markets such as Denmark, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, and Greece.
Both first and second-division soccer are covered.
The rights were first put up for tender on July 27, with submissions due on August 23. At that point, European Leagues said it would give bidders the option of three or five-year deals.
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By GlobalDataIt is the third and biggest centralized fast betting data rights package to have been allocated by European Leagues, following offerings in 2017 and 2019.
In 2019, multi-year deals were struck with sports data and technology companies Sportradar, Genius Sports and Stats Perform for the rights across 16 leagues.
When sending out the latest tender, European League said it would consider both exclusive and non-exclusive offers and that those with additional “data-related services” would be welcomed but that the overriding factor will be the maximization of value for the members.
Jacco Swart, European Leagues managing director, has now said: “We are pleased to have supported our members as they form an exciting new partnership with IMG Arena. It marks a new era for European football data and is a true reflection of our mission to enhance and protect the national competitions run by the domestic leagues.”
Freddie Longe, IMG Arena’s executive vice-president and managing director, added: “This new relationship with the European Leagues will be transformational for our business and reinforces our position as a global leader in sports data capture and distribution technology.
“We are passionate about protecting the integrity of sport and have had a consistent position and commitment to distribution of official content since our launch in 2012.”
The leagues and organizations now in partnership with IMG Arena are as follows:
- Austrian Bundesliga
- Belgium Pro League
- Czech League Football Association
- Danish League
- Finnish Football League Association
- German Football Association (for the top-tier women’s league and third-tier men’s league)
- Super League Greece
- Israeli Professional Football League
- Professional Football League of Kazakhstan
- Latvian Optibet Virslīga
- The Netherlands’ top-tier Eredivisie and second-tier Eerste Divisie
- Norwegian Professional Football League
- Liga Portugal
- Romanian Professional Football League
- Serbian Super Liga
- Slovak Fortuna Liga
- Föreningen Svensk Elitfotboll
- Swiss Football League
IMG Arena, which is based in the UK, is adding European Leagues to a client base that already includes soccer organizations such as the English Football Association and North America’s Major League Soccer, as well as mixed martial arts’ UFC, tennis’ ATP, and golf’s European Tour and PGA Tour.
Last month, IMG Arena secured betting data and streaming distribution rights to the top-tier Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) Tour.
The partnership sees IMG’s Golf Event Centre (GEC) deliver real-time shot-by-shot data and information to a series of worldwide sportsbooks.
Live-streaming video and interactive course visualizations are sent out to partners through the GEC, which over the last 12 months has performed a similar role for other top-tier golf tournaments.
