‘The World Is Watching’: How Visa Brought NFTs to the 2022 FIFA World Cup
The 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar is the first World Cup with non-fungible tokens (NFTs), with payments giant Visa partnering with Crypto.com to bring user-generated digital collectibles to the popular sporting event. From now until December 18, global soccer fans visiting the FIFA Fan Festival will be able to experience Visa’s “Masters of Movement” experience, where they can jump on top of an LED soccer field and draw their own NFT designs with their feet. The resulting design will be sent to them as a digital souvenir.
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On the LED floor, fans don a tracking vest and play with an Adidas tracking ball based on motion sensor technology made by Kinexon. An artwork algorithm logs the movements and movements of fans dynamically moving around the pitch, creating original NFT artwork designed by British experimental art firm XK Studio. Fans can even get their NFTs minted by Crypto.com if they simply scan a QR code in Qatar.
“We want to create these lasting experiences for fans who are in the venue [in Qatar]Andrea Fairchild, Senior Vice President of Global Sponsorship Strategy at Visa, told TheStreet Crypto. “We want to uplift the local communities and then really make an impact on the global sports community,”
Visa.
Fairchild said Visa and Crypto.com’s collaboration was “a mutual partnership” born out of Crypto.com’s existing relationship with FIFA. The crypto exchange is a major sponsor of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
“It really gives us an opportunity during the World Cup to celebrate the love of the game, the technology and the art of movement,” added Fairchild. “It’s the first time we’ve been able to bring all these elements together in one place.”
Fairchild said the company spent more than a year developing the proposal for the fan experience. “The concept of the idea grew based on where we are in the culture,” she said, noting that NFTs had exploded in popularity over the past year, and Visa knew they wanted to showcase the power of NFTs while also celebrating artists who latched onto technology. In particular, Visa wanted to help users create NFTs in a safe environment, converting iconic movements on the field into “dynamic works of art.”
“As a sponsor of the FIFA World Cup, Visa enables the movement of money around the world fluidly and seamlessly, which we then mapped back to the love of the game of global football and how the players move on the pitch,” she said. “NFTs gave us the opportunity to articulate that in a unique way.”
But Visa has experimented with jumping on board the NFT craze long before the World Cup. Last summer, Visa spent $150,000 on a CryptoPunk NFT, calling the digital memorabilia a “cultural icon.”
“We believe NFTs will play an important role in the future of retail, social media, entertainment and commerce,” Cuy Sheffield, head of crypto at Visa, said at the time. Earlier this year, the company also unveiled a year-long NFT Creators Program to support a global group of artists, musicians, fashion designers and filmmakers.
“We’ve seen rapid growth in the NFT ecosystem over the past year,” Sheffield said, calling it a new form of e-commerce. “What’s so exciting for us about NFTs is that we think it lowers the barrier to entry for people to build a business and sell online.”
In October, Visa also filed two metaverse trademarks with the US Patent and Trademark Office, saying the company was looking to manage crypto wallets, NFTs and digital currency transactions. In particular, Visa plans to offer software to audit crypto and manage virtual transactions.
Last year, Visa also announced a much-anticipated plan for a “universal adapter” for central bank digital currencies around the world. The project will allow merchants, blockchain systems and customers to perform transactions seamlessly across multiple networks and different digital wallets.
The 2022 FIFA World Cup is notable for prominent crypto sponsorship, but also a return to personalized sporting events and fan experiences. “The world is watching,” Fairchild told TheStreet Crypto. “They are all coming to the World Cup in Qatar; it is one of the biggest sporting events in the world. So it gives us the opportunity to tell the story we want to tell and immerse consumers in an experience that is timely, culturally relevant, and hopefully helps them become more educated in areas [like crypto and NFTs] which we feel are important.”
“We’re always trying to anticipate the next move and we’re at the forefront of developing new digital payment solutions for people across the economy and making it feel like a safe environment,” she said. “We’re testing some of these new technologies that are only going to improve the fan experience.”
The 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar is the first World Cup with non-fungible tokens (NFTs), with payments giant Visa partnering with Crypto.com to bring user-generated digital collectibles to the popular sporting event. From now until December 18, global soccer fans visiting the FIFA Fan Festival will be able to experience Visa’s “Masters of Movement” experience, where they can jump on top of an LED soccer field and draw their own NFT designs with their feet. The resulting design will be sent to them as a digital souvenir. Subscribe for the full article
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