SINGAPORE: Global sports marketing agency SPORTFIVE and Be Media, a subsidiary of Animoca Brands, announced Thursday a partnership to jointly launch Onside, the first non-fungible tokens (NFTs) digital collectibles for the AFF Mitsubishi Electric Cup 2022, ASEAN’s premier football tournament that will take place from 20 December to 16 January 2023.
The partnership is the first of its kind in the Southeast Asian sporting landscape and will see the ASEAN football competition come to life in the Web3 space with SPORTFIVE collaborating with Animoca Brands and Be Media to mint and distribute NFT digital collectibles on the Polygon blockchain based on
tournament assets and video highlights from the popular regional tournament.
The platform will extend football fans’ experience and engagement with the tournament into the realms of NFTs and digital collectibles.
The first Onside digital collectibles will be launched on OnsideCollection.com. Onside will be the home of the official NFTs for the tournament and beyond, where fans will be able to own digital products such as Alpha masks and match moments from the competition.
The partnership with Be Media and Animoca Brands will allow SPORTFIVE and the ASEAN Football Federation to enhance fan engagement around game day through digital experiences via gaming and the wider Web3 ecosystem.
Onside will expand to deliver rewards and real-world experiences, identified as ‘utility’, through game day activations such as exclusive on-pitch access, access to post-game press conferences and digital games or rewards within the Animoca Brands ecosystem.
The Onside NFTs will be sold in ‘packs’ like conventional trading cards, similar to the model taken by The Australian Football League (AFL) with AFL Mint and the National Basketball Association (NBA) with NBA Top Shot.
Starting this month, fans interested in purchasing the digital collectibles can register their interest at OnsideCollection.com for the chance to own a piece of ASEAN football history when the first officially licensed NFT ‘drop’ is released, prior to the tournament starting in December.
This partnership is part of SPORTFIVE’s global growth strategy and sees the agency firmly establish itself in the Web3 space. This comes on the back of the agency’s recently announced global partnership with leading blockchain protocol Polygon, where SPORTFIVE will be the Global Agency of Record for Polygon across Sports and Entertainment.
