Gaming
International Hockey Fed partners NAGRA to deliver novel digital experience for fans
MUMBAI: The International Hockey Federation (FIH), the world’s governing body for the sport of hockey, and NAGRA, a Kudelski Group company and the world's leading independent provider of content protection and multi-screen video solutions, have signed a ten-year partnership that brings together the established sports leadership of the FIH and NAGRA’s market-leading digital media solutions to deliver a ground-breaking fan engagement service.
The new platform will be the “home of hockey”, creating a central community for the 30 million players, fans, and officials worldwide. It will also benefit the global growth of the sport through new awareness, expanded fan engagement, and new sources of revenue for the FIH.
Deployed and operated by NAGRA as a “sports-as-a-service” offering, the multi-faceted digital platform will be developed for web, mobile and smart TVs. It will include live matches, replays, highlights, videos, archives, news, articles, live scores, results, and statistics, as well as innovative social sharing functionality where fans and participants can capture and share instant moments online. The new service will be launched simultaneously with the resumption of live international matches. In addition, the platform will provide the FIH, continental federations, national associations and clubs with a centralized management service for their millions of participants and fans.
“With more than 30 million participants, the International Hockey Federation has always had great ambition for the worldwide promotion and development of its sport. Improving our digital engagement for the whole hockey community, and primarily our fans and athletes, has been one of our key objectives,” said FIH CEO Thierry Weil. “We are thrilled – especially in this challenging period – to engage in a long-term partnership with a global technology leader to achieve our goals. I want to thank NAGRA for their commitment and trust, we view this as a game-changing agreement that takes our digital development to the next level."
"This is the start of a wider journey that goes beyond just sports streaming,” said Jean-Luc Jezouin, SVP Sales Development for NAGRA. “With this partnership, we are taking field hockey into a realm of global digital transformation and harnessing the power of player participation as well as fandom. NAGRA's cloud-based video content management technologies and services and drive for innovative business transformation will enable the FIH to deliver a new level of engagement for the sport and provide hockey fans with an unmatched experience.”
Gaming
Dream Sports sees 100 plus exits after gaming ban forces overhaul
Company splits into eight units as real money gaming law hits revenue.
MUMBAI: For a company built on fantasy leagues, reality has suddenly rewritten the rulebook. More than 100 employees have exited Dream Sports, the parent of Dream11, after the company reorganised its operations following India’s ban on real money online gaming. The shake up came after the Promotion and Regulation of Online Gaming Act, 2025 came into force in August 2025, prohibiting games where users deposit money expecting winnings. The regulation struck at the heart of the fantasy gaming industry and dramatically affected Dream Sports’ core business, wiping out about 95 percent of its revenue and all of its profits.
In response, the Mumbai based company shifted into what chief executive officer Harsh Jain described as “startup mode”, splitting its operations into eight independent business units in December.
Around 700 employees were reassigned across these newly formed ventures based on their experience and interests. However, roughly 15 percent opted to leave the company.
A spokesperson for Dream Sports said many of those who exited were experienced professionals accustomed to running scaled businesses rather than early stage ventures.
“Since some of these employees were experienced with running high scale businesses and not startups, around 15 percent chose to leave and join other scaled companies or start ventures of their own,” the spokesperson said.
Despite the departures, the company noted that the attrition rate is only slightly higher than its earlier level of around 10 percent before the ban. Dream Sports now has close to 950 employees and is not currently hiring, choosing instead to focus on stabilising its existing workforce.
The restructuring has transformed Dream Sports from a fantasy gaming company into a broader sports entertainment platform. The eight units now operate independently, each focusing on different segments of the sports and technology ecosystem.
These include Dream11, sports streaming platform Fancode, sports travel service DreamSetGo, mobile game Dream Cricket and artificial intelligence initiative Dream Sports AI, which includes sports analytics platform Dream Play.
Other ventures include fintech product Dream Money, open source initiative Dream Horizon and the philanthropic arm Dream Sports Foundation.
As part of cost saving efforts, Dream Sports also relocated its headquarters from Bandra Kurla Complex to Worli earlier this year. The new office, called Dream Sports Stadium, brings teams from its various brands together under one roof to improve collaboration and operational efficiency.
Jain had earlier said the company removed bonus lock in timelines for employees hired in recent years, allowing those who wished to leave to exit with pro rata payouts.
“We want people who are fully into the startup mode and willing to work for it, and we will share that reward if it comes,” he said.
Founded in 2008 by Harsh Jain and Bhavit Sheth, Dream Sports was last valued at 8 billion dollars after raising 840 million dollars in 2021 from investors including Falcon Edge Capital, DST Global, D1 Capital Partners, RedBird Capital Partners, Tiger Global Management, TPG and Footpath Ventures.
The new gaming law has forced several companies in the fantasy gaming sector to either shut down or pivot their business models, signalling a significant reset for one of India’s fastest growing digital entertainment industries.
