MALTA, 28th October 2019: Chiliz (Binance.com: $CHZ), supported for 4 years by Chinese investor Feng Bo of Ceyuan Ventures, is opening a blockchain hub in Beijing, focussing on research and development as well as strategic partnerships, to support the Chinese sports industry’s adoption of blockchain technology.

The company, who have existing multi-year partnerships with Juventus, Paris Saint-Germain, Atlético de Madrid, Galatasaray, West Ham United and AS Roma, wants to help Chinese sports teams to leverage blockchain for fan engagement and connect Chinese fans with European football teams through their fan engagement and rewards platform Socios.com. Juventus, AS Roma and Atletico de Madrid all posted on their Weibo accounts earlier today, stating they are proud to be embracing blockchain through Chiliz and Socios.com to bring their Chinese fans closer to the club.

Alexandre Dreyfus, CEO of Chiliz & Socios.com said: “Following Chinese President Xi Jinping’s announcement last week that the country should accelerate the development of blockchain technology as a core for innovation, financial influencers have predicted a big focus on blockchain and sports.

“China is a big market for European football. For example, our partner Juventus has more fans in China than it has in Italy. With European football clubs focussing on both recruiting Chinese fans and building fan engagement in the Chinese market, there has never been a better time for us to help the Chinese sports industry to embrace blockchain.”

Feng Bo, Founder of Ceyuan Ventures said: “Blockchain can be leveraged in many sectors, but the tokenization of sports teams is going to be massive and Chiliz is already global leader. We are thrilled that they will soon be able to help Chinese initiatives with our support and more strategic partnerships.”

Inspired by the ‘socios’ membership model favoured by numerous Spanish clubs, Socios.com is a first-of-its-kind blockchain-based mobile app for sports and entertainment fans. As Official Token Partners of 7 top tier sports teams, including DOTA 2 Champions OG, Socios.com helps teams stay closer to their fans through Fan Tokens – digital assets that give fans the right to vote in certain club-delegated decisions and rewards them for their participation.

Fans use $CHZ, the app’s official digital currency to purchase Fan Tokens. The more fans vote and interact with the club through the app, the more rewards they can earn, competing for once-in-a-lifetime experiences, and gaining access to exclusive merchandise, games and leaderboards. Fan Token holders will enjoy exclusive rights on the platform, including access to unique and exclusive experiences, promotions, draws and polls.

To promote the Fan Tokens, each club will host dedicated marketing campaigns, including high profile social media campaigns, featuring key players. Several such campaigns have already taken place, including one viral video for Juventus which featured first-team stars Daniele Rugani, Blaise Matuidi, Miralem Pjanic and Federico Bernardeschi. The video shows the players debating which is the best goal celebration before using Socios.com to ask the fans their opinion. This campaign, together with marketing efforts with other partner clubs, has driven nearly 80,000 early sign-ups ahead of launch.

As a company, Chiliz has grown rapidly since raising $66m in 2018. The company now has 60+ team members, spanning 24 different nationalities, and across multiple disciplines, bringing with them invaluable experience from industries such as sports, gaming, entertainment and payment solutions.

Notes to editor:

About Chiliz

Chiliz ($CHZ) is a digital currency for sports and entertainment platforms. It fuels the world’s first scalable, tokenized voting & rewards platform, Socios.com, where fans can buy, trade and execute voting rights in their favourite sports teams. The Chiliz project has raised $66 million from some of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges and leading crypto funds in Asia, including Binance, OK Blockchain Capital and Ceyuan Ventures. Chiliz is owned by Malta-based Mediarex Group, a global sports and entertainment organisation, which was founded in 2012.

Socios.com helps football clubs achieve digital transformation through blockchain technology. Socios.com is powered by the Chiliz token ($CHZ), both an ERC20 utility token on the Ethereum blockchain and BEP-2 token on Binance Chain. Fan Tokens are specific to a team or a club, and are a finite, digital asset that provides access to an encrypted, immutable ledger of voting and membership rights ownership. The tokenized fan-voting platform uses Fan Tokens, which operate on a separate permissioned side chain. The Fan Tokens are limited in number, and are fungible, meaning their ownership can be traded, and their price is driven by the market. The venture was inspired by the fan-led management frameworks or ‘socios’ of some major football clubs. Dubbed ‘Socios 2.0’, the platform simply represents the digitisation of this model of management.