Preview of China Basketball Summit 2015 (IV) : China and FIBA

On August 7th 2015, FIBA announced China is awarded the rights to organize the 2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup. And China’s national basketball team triumphed in the 2015 FIBA Asia Championship, promoting to the Olympic Games for the 8th time in a row. Chinese basketball has started reestablishment and staged a comeback from the sag over the last fewer years.

Additionally, Chinese government shows the ambition to develop sports into a RMB5 trillion industry by 2025. Accordingly, sports draws unprecedented attentions from all sectors, marking a key turning point for Chinese basketball and sports in general.

Under this historical background, the China Basketball Summit 2015 will bring in a delegation of basketball experts like Wangfei and the stories between NBA and China. And today we will talk about FIBA, of which a delegate will also take part in the Summit.

Kelvin Fang, a consultant of Patrick Bauman who is currently the Secretary-General at FIBA, will be the ambassador of FIBA to attend the 2015 China Basketball Summit.

In August, China received more votes than Philippines in the contest for the hosting rights to 2019 FIBA World Cup. It resulted from the qualifications of China in hosting ma.jor international sports events along with efforts of Chinese bid team.

A delegate, led by IOC vice president Yu Zaiqing, Beijing’s deputy mayor Zhang Jiandong, basketball commentator Xu Jicheng, assistant director of State General Administration of Sport and former NBA star Yao Ming, of Chinese bid team made an exciting statement ahead of the ultimate voting. Former NBA star and Chinese basketball legend Yao Ming, particularly, highlighted the team. 24 FIBA Executive committee members decided that China wins the rights to organize the 2019 FIBA World Cup. And it will make China the first Asian country both have hosted FIBA Women’s World Championships and to organize FIBA World Cup (or FIBA World Championships).

According to the presentation, 2019 FIBA Basketball World Cup will be hosted in China. The eight host cities are Nanjing, Suzhou, Beijing, Wuhan, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Foshan and Dongguan. The FIBA delegation visited the eight cities from February 28 to March 6, and have finalized their hosting qualification.

FIBA Basketball World Cup, formerly known as FIBA World Championship, is the flagship event contested by the men's national teams of the FIBA members. The championship has been held every four years since the inaugural tournament in 1950, except for two occasions. In January, 2012, FIFA announced that the championship was renamed as FIBA Basketball World Cup. In 2014, Spain held the first event after the name changing.

The upcoming event is the second tournament of FIBA World Cup. It was rescheduled from 2018 to 2019, to avoid scheduling conflicts with 2018 FIFA World Cup. Five years later after the first tournament, the event will welcome 32 (instead of 24) competing teams.

Will the expanding of competing teams affect the match quality? The answer is no, according to Lubomir Kotleba, the former Technical Director and current Special Adviser of FIBA. Of course, contests between 32 teams will be different from those between 24. But FIBA has adjusted the tournament format. Under this format, even some weak teams won’t be eliminated at the very beginning. In 2019, the teams may be divided into eight preliminary round groups of four teams each. In other words, each teams may have to play in three group matches. In addition, the schedule of qualification has been changed. The 2019 FIBA World Cup Qualifier will start from October 2017, two years prior to the final matches. Obviously, this event will become a Race to China.

The lineup of 32 teams may remind people of the format of the FIFA World Cup finals.The FIBA officers are also aware of this imagination. However, it makes no sense to compare the two events. After all, their influences are quite different.

As Lubomir Kotleba once told media, it’s nearly unattainable for basketball to keep pace with football, no matter in the size of audience or in the business development. But FIBA are striving for narrowing the huge gap, though the football circle is a very different world. In fact, FIBA hope that basketball will become the most popular indoor sport. The international association is actively promoting the 3 on 3 basketball, and it is expected to become an Olympic game, like the beach volleyball did.

FIBA has started to hold the world-class 3x3 tournaments since 2012. The 3x3, also known as street basketball, originates from the street culture. It is a popular urban team sport as well as an important part of hip-hop culture. The game has developed rapidly all over the world, because it simply needs ordinary facilities and less formal formats. As shown in public data, the number of 3x3 players has reached 250 million worldwide. Evidently, the sport has become one of the most popular forms of entertainment.

In recent years, this basketball discipline is being promoted and structured by FIBA, the sport's governing body. 3x3 made its worldwide competitive debut at the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics in Singapore. After the success in Singapore, FIBA made a long-term goal to have 3x3 included in the Olympic Games Programme.

In my opinion, the reason why FIBA is beginning to focus on 3x3 basketball events is that the basketball governing body is under great pressure imposed by NBA. For example, I believe not so many fans know the first squad of Serbia team, runner up of the last edition FIBA World Cup but everyone know all the players of US men’s team. Not to mention the difference between how much attentions we pay to NBA and FIBA basketball events.

According to statistics of Repucom, there are 2 billion soccer fans worldwide. Though less influential than soccer, basketball fans can reach 1.2 billion, which is largely contributed by Chinese fans. For that reason, FIBA is increasingly attaching great importance to Chinese market in the promotion of 3x3 basketball events.

Ignacio Sorian, FIBA 3x3 events manager said that FIFA has organized a series of events to promote 3x3 basketball events. Among all of the events, The Masters has quickly made a great difference among international players and fans since its launch for its unique entertaining and mass participation

“Although many cities are bidding for the rights to host a 3x3 basketball event in their venues, FIFA need to consider many factors when deciding the host city. We have been considering whether this event can be staged in Chinese and Wukesong MasterCard Center is a good choice,”Ignacio Soriano said in an interview.

Hanlifeng, the directing manager of Wukesong MasterCard Center Operation Management told Yutang Sports in a previous interview that Wukesong has signed a long term partnership deal with FIBA. Under the deal, Wukesong will be the hosting venue of FIBA 3x3 World Tour Beijing Masters, the highest level of mass basketball event in Asia, for the next ten years starting from 2014. Teams registered for the event will not be charged for any entry fee. Wukesong is take practical action in support of the youth basketball.

In this year’s source promotion conference held by CCTV 5, representatives from 3x3 basketball event got an opportunity to deliver a keynote speech, indicating that the event has been well received by the national sports media and will have a great market potential in future’s development in China. I think this is what FIBA would like to see and it is in line with the development plan of FIBA.

Together with Yutang Sports, let’s wait and see! 

About the China Basketball Summit 2015

After Beijing’s successful bid for the rights to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, China was awarded the rights to host the 2019 FIBA World Cup after defeating the Philippines on Aug.7, 2015. This good news makes the whole country jubilant.  At the same time, the General Administration of Chinese Sport deepened the reform of sports management systems in response to the reform plan drawn up by the State Council. The China Basketball Summit 2015 has been launched under these conditions.

The China Basketball Summit 2015, organized by Pioneer Sports, will be held in Shanghai from December 10th to 11th. The summit will be a combination of Chinese basketball professionals along with marketers and experts from America, Europe and other parts of the world. The summit will also serves as a perfect platform for those professionals and experts to tap into the tremendous business opportunities within the industry. They can exchange views on the commercial operation of professional clubs, youth basketball training and other issues that need to be addressed urgently in the current Chinese basketball market with the aim of addressing the weaknesses in Chinese basketball and making a big leap forward.

Pioneer Sports is committed to building a long-term professional platform for the exchange between Chinese basketball and international basketball. At the same time they would aim to provide a consulting service and expertise for clubs and public institutions on basketball-related strategy, organisation, operations and technology. Saipao 360, an online ticket-selling company and Yutang Sports, a premium sports marketing company in China, will serve as the co-organisers of the summit and so provide their considerable support.

Yutang will also bring you the most compelling topics and cutting-edge insights from the front as well some exclusive interviews with distinguished guests!

Click Here to Apply!

http://www.pioneersports.cn/Contactus.html

Distinguished Guests

David Yang

Senior Vice President

NBA China

As Senior Vice President of Business Affairs for NBA China, David Yang oversees NBA's youth and basketball development efforts and directs the league's government affairs, branded destinations business, NBA Global Games, communications and social responsibility operations in China.

Under his leadership, NBA China and the Chinese Ministry of Education established a groundbreaking partnership that aims to further youth development through basketball in elementary, middle and high schools across China.  Since October 2014, NBA China and the Ministry of Education have jointly launched a series of initiatives including the Jr. NBA High School League in Beijing, the development of NBA style basketball curriculum that aims to provide enhanced basketball training to at least three million students, basketball exchange programs and a RMB 10 million (US $1.6 million) pledge in a joint effort to build and refurbish public basketball courts across China. 

Han Lifeng

Han Lifeng, currently serves as General Manager of Bloomage International (Beijing) Wukesong Arena Management Co., Ltd .He manage the group of   venues including MasterCard Center, Huiyuan space, Hi-Park , Wukesong Cultural&Sports Plaza.

Han Lifeng is a domestic specialist in the sports and cultural venues’ commercialized operation. The MasterCard Center which led by him has the profitability of the strongest and highest space-utilization. He spearheaded the creation of five-into-one service system, venue security procedures, which provides a textbook-class theory for commercial venues operation mode.

Tom McCarthy

Chairman

Beijing International Group (BIG)

BIG Lifestyle Development Limited (BLDL)

Positive image limited (PIL)

McCarthy has served Asia & China in the fields of sports, education, corporate consultancy & services, and lifestyle development since 1987. Prior to creating the present group of companies, his wide experience as a former global corporate basketball marketing senior executive, multi-level coach, & player, contributed to providing him a unique perspective into global basketball development. In China, McCarthy has participated for over 20 years in every area and level of basketball from event organizer, coach/player clinician & author, university lecturer, Olympic consultant, and philanthropist working with 4 national sports associations as well as creating a unique pyramid (local-international) model for sport development, and implementing cutting edge corporate/client care programs to maximize sports rights & benefits.

Yu Xingyu

Chief Operating Officer

Alisports

Born in 1976, Chief Operating Officer of Alisports. Once acted as senior Vice President of BesTV, chief editor of TV189, General Manager of mobile video operating center under China Telecom, content chief officer and editor of oriental broadband network of SMG. Having participated in the planning and operating of large-scale programs such as the 2006 Germany World Cup, 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, and 2010 Shanghai World Expo.

Li Yanming

Vice President

China Interactive Sports Technology Invention Co., Ltd.Mr. Yanming Li, who served as the Vice President of a group company then as the Chief Investment Representative of a Hong Kong Listed company after graduating from the Chinese University of Hong Kong with the lifelong honor of the Member of Beta Gamma Sigma （By AACSB）. Now, he works as the Vice President of the China Interactive Sports Technology Invention Co., Ltd., in charge of the portal site of China Interactive Sports and the official website of China Sport Lottery.

Zheng Wen

Mr. Zheng Wen has worked as President for InfrontChina,Managing Director Greater China for Octagon and Marketing & LicensingManager for IMG U.S. H/Q. Mr. Zheng is the first Chinese heading the China business for major international sports marketing companies. Mr. Zheng is one of the senior executives in the sports marketing area, who has combined 20 years working experience, international perspective, overseas and local management expertise as well as the insights in the New Economy.

Shoto Zhu

Founder and CEO

OCEANS SPORTS & ENTERTAINMENT INC

Working in sports industry at his 18th year, Shoto ZHU has become one of the key opinion leaders in sport marketing in Asia. After providing his services to the J.League, FIFA Marketing, Dentsu Sports and China Football Association in the early years, Shoto founded the company OCEANS Sports & Entertainment Inc which then grow into a key market player in the Chinese booming sport industry in recent years. Listed in Chinese Stock Exchange Market at Jan 2014, OCEANS is now providing its services to Federations, Clubs, Brands and Media companies for sport management, sponsorship consultancy and media rights acquisition/sales, as well as investing in growing sport properties all over Asia.

Mason Gordon

Mason Gordon is a proven brand-builder, having produced innovative sports projects since rolling out the original sport, SlamBall with Mike Tollin on Spike TV and CBS. SlamBall has produced over a hundred episodes of television programming to date and aired in 91 countries. In partnership with Michael Sun, SlamBall China has further developed the game, expanding into grass roots and dedicated SlamBall Centers, in addition to hosting the last two World Championship Series. Gordon has since produced NBA Summer Dreams for CBS, following pro basketball prospects from the highest draft picks to the longest of long shots, The Making of the SuperBowl Halftime Show with Katie Perry for the NFL, a 48 film series for Vice Sports and the critically acclaimed comedy The Comeback: Baron Davis for NBA on TNT. Mr. Gordon is currently the Co-Chairman of Multinational SlamBall Athletic Association, CEO of SlamBall LLC. and Executive Producer of Manadaly Sports Media LLC.