Gerard Piqué debuts as a guest professor at Harvard analyzing the Kings League phenomenon

Gerard Piqué debuted this week as a visiting professor at Harvard, in Boston. He has done so to analyze the phenomenon of the Kings League in a case study as part of a subject on the business of sports integrated into an MBA (Master of Business Administration) at the same university. Piqué was invited by the director of the Business of Entertainment, Media and Sports course, Anita Elberse, who, together with the Spanish researcher David Moreno, presented their students with a case study about the launch of the Kings League and how it can revolutionize football audiences. More information Precisely, the former Catalan footballer took this same training course in a short four-day format, also at Harvard, in 2017. He also did it with the help of Professor Elberse. Other personalities such as the actress Katie Holmes and the athlete Pau Gasol also completed these studies. On this occasion, and with Piqué as master of ceremonies, the classes focused on how the Kings League has become one of the sports entertainment products of the moment through a native narrative of social networks, a transgressive competition format and a close connection with the community, according to various media. The competition founded by the former Barça footballer held its first matches on January 1, 2023, a key day, with hardly any sporting competition and with all the media focus in its favor. It was designed from the beginning as an eminently digital product, with short matches, gamified rules, that is, with a lot of game component and something far from classic sport: there were a lot of penalties, the so-called secret weapons or unlimited substitutions. They achieved, and that was one of their objectives – they started from the realization that the new generations were disengaging from football and could not stand in front of the television for the 90 minutes that a match lasts – a powerful interaction with the audience. From the beginning it was promoted through Twitch or YouTube, drawing on the impact of the streamers involved. That fueled its viralization. Two years later, the format, which has enjoyed the support and even participation of big names in world football, such as Kun Agüero or Iker Casillas, even Lamine Yamal, has already expanded with men’s and women’s leagues in Spain and Mexico, as well as men’s leagues in Brazil, France, Italy, Germany, the Middle East and North Africa, and soon in the United States. The 7-a-side football competition on artificial grass closed its first full year with a turnover of 20 million euros, according to the sports business finance portal Palco23. The league has functioned effectively as a social and short content consumption product, it has had peaks of millions of viewers in key events and large numbers in impressions and views on networks. However, the audience is not regular, the real profitability of the business is not publicized and its dependence on the model that served so well to promote it may also be one of its handicaps: the format lives on novelty and the ecosystem of creators, if this varies or interest wanes, stability is in danger. The Kings League represents, without a doubt, an innovative and successful model, but it has challenges ahead to maintain the interest of the audience and investors and sponsors. «It is an honor that the Kings League is analyzed by an institution as respected as Harvard Business School. The study validates the impact of our work,» said Piqué, proud of the experience. Several students wore FC Barcelona t-shirts in the photo that all the students took with the former Barcelona footballer at the end of class.