Sportel is about quality, not about quantity

SINGAPORE: Sports media’s most well-connected matchmakers, Laurent Puons, managing director of Monaco Mediax/Sportel, and Agnès Marsan, executive director of Sportel Asia, have built a business around bringing the right people into the same room. A few years after Sportel last pitched its tent in Asia, in Bali with 700 participants, the duo brought the show back, this time to Singapore, with a sharper focus and a different philosophy: fewer people, better conversations and bigger decisions. Quality over quantity, as they put it, without apology. Indiantelevision.com got into a conversation with them on what makes Sportel tick and attractive to the community. Excerpts:

On the choice of Singapore as a venue for Sportel Asia.

Laurent: Last time when we came to Asia it was in Bali eight years ago, it was great. We had more than 700 participants. We made a decision to come back to Singapore because we are convinced that it is important for the European and Australian communities to join the event here. The goal of Sportel Asia in March is to group various communities such as European, Australians, Chinese, and Asian and to provide them an opportunity to do business and to shape the future of their activity sector.

Agnes: Basically, it is also because Singapore is also a very central location for sports and sports tech. It has a lot of companies operating in these sectors. There are a lot of leagues also here. And also it is very accessible for all. Also for India it is easier to come to Singapore than to come to Monaco. The goal of the spring event is to organise a regional one to promote sports and brands for them to get to know Sportel. And later to bring them to Sportel Monaco which is our flagship event. That’s our goal. It is the biggest gathering for the business – for the media rights community. The Asian version helps us to introduce new sports companies that don’t know us.

On the attendance.

Laurent: We had about 400 participants. Our goal is not quantity, but our focus is on quality.

Agnes: Yes indeed. More than 60 per cent of the participants in both Singapore and Monaco are from the C-level. Decision makers. There were a lot of content buyers, broadcasters who attended Sportel Singapore this year. That is why we are very happy about this edition.

On whether the outcomes for Sportel Asia were met.

Agnes: We look for our participants to make deals. They sign contracts. Sportel in Singapore and Miami are niche markets and we target to attract around 500 participants to each of them. And these are very high level people who take decisions.  Beyond that, it will be challenging.

Laurent: It is very important for the community to do good business.

How does Sportel Monaco differ from Sportel Asia.

Agnes: Monaco is totally different like 2,000 participants having back to back meetings. It is the speed dating of business. And if you are a new company, you don’t know where to go. Sportel Singapore is in a hotel ballroom, there are many networking events, a welcome party etc. It’s easier to make contacts if you are a new company. You get to know people as it’s easier to reach them. We organised a welcome party a day before the event started and we also put together a visit to the National stadium, the sports museum of Singapore for a small group of 20 people. These provide additional networking opportunities. In Monaco, if you don’t know people, you have no network, it can be difficult. Here you have the possibility of sitting down and talking to people and they speak to you. In Monaco that’s not possible if you don’t have pre-fixed meetings.

On how the west Asian conflict impacted Sportel Asia.

Agnes: It’s normal that there was no participation from the middle east. It’s normal. We also lost some European participants who would have otherwise come in the last week through their flight connections from Dubai but chose not because of the war. We had only three cancellations. People found it important to attend and they did it, despite having to change their flights.  We are satisfied with the attendance as are the clients who attended.

But we had 20 per cent new participants. We had about 15-20 exhibitors. The pods are companies who want to have extra visibility during the events through their pods.

On Sportel Middle east plans.

Laurent: We don’t know. It will be not possible for us to have it this year because of the conflict in the middle east.  The last time we went to Dubai it was 20 years ago. It’s a huge market there. Hopefully, one day we can go. And sometime later in India.