69 START-UP ALLEY Fan Arena
FAN ARENA
COUNTRY: BELGIUM STARTED: 2015
Thanks to its innovative national broadcasting and telco sectors, as well as initiatives launched by its government, banks such as KBC and R&D hubs such as Imec, Belgium has become a hotbed for digital start-ups. One beneficiary has been Fan Arena, a Flanders-based fan engagement software company that aims to help media companies get more out of their existing audiences and tap into new ones. According to the firm’s co-founder, Octavian Susnea, fan engagement in the digital space is a relatively untapped area among traditional media players. “In the nineties, newspapers used to run fantasy football leagues. When digital came along, these were replicated in exactly the same way. I thought it was possible to innovate a bit more,” he says. While fans are now able to search for stats and content that is relevant to their own interests, Susnea believes we’re now entering “the third wave of fan engagement” in which content is available anytime, everywhere in an increasingly personalised and engaging fashion. “And one way of increasing engagement is through gamification,” he adds. Three years ago Susnea, himself a huge fantasy sports fan, started developing his own game, testing it out on friends, and eventually receiving finance from Belgian broadband provider Telenet – via an incubation programme – to develop the concept into a B2B, SAAS-based platform. Imec, an R&D innovation hub, stepped in to bolster funds at the end of 2016, but, according to Susnea, the company is now self-sufficient and seeking more clients rather than further investment. The start-up has already delivered mobile apps, fantasy sports games, chatbots and automated content for a variety of Belgian
FAN MAIL Flanders-based Fan Arena uses gamification to help media companies engage with their audiences in new ways
deliver the world’s first fantasy hockey game in time for the Hockey World Cup in India (which kicks off at the end of November). “The aim is to engage the whole hockey community on the platform – the players, the brands and the fans – with a fantasy sports game and a sponsoring brand to generate revenue,” he explains. The platform also comes with a built-in analytics dashboard, allowing clients to monitor KPIs. Pricing is structured on a client-by-client basis, and depends on reach, the kind of package the customer wants and the value that the game is likely to deliver, although Susnea adds: “we are not that expensive, and can deliver some projects for under 100,000 Euros.” The Fan Arena team, which also includes co-founder and business developer Luuk Janseen, currently comprises five full-time staff with a regular band of freelancers stepping in when the company needs to scale up on projects. Next year there are plans to extend the project beyond the company’s native territory of Belgium, pushing into France, Italy and Spain. Susnea adds that the firm has also started to reach out to betting firms, sports federations, social networks and esports organisations, who have all expressed interest in the platform.
media companies including Telenet, newspaper publisher De Persgroep and La Permanence, a digital race guide for cycling enthusiasts. One of its most high profile use cases has been for Flemish public service broadcaster VRT’s sports brand Sporza during this summer’s World Cup. Fan Arena developed an online fantasy game enabling fans to pick 11 players within a budget of 300 million Euros. Users earned points based on the performances of their players in real life and were also able to transfer players, pick a coach for bonus points and invite friends to join a mini competition. Usage peaked at 10,000 fans in a 24-hour period with the game attracting 40K registered users who generated 35,000 teams. “In a small population like Flanders [approx. 6.5m] this is a good number,” Susnea adds. The firm has also been working with field hockey social network Scorred to ONEWAY OF INCREASING ENGAGEMENT IS THROUGH GAMIFICATION
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