The other levers that Laporta has the ability to activate are the sale of 15% more of the television rights and the sales of up to 49.9% of Barça Licensing & Merchandising (the club’s merchandising) and Barça Studios (the producer audiovisual). For all three it has the approval of the partners. The priority the board is giving to these operations is so great that it is stopping the progress of other matters that are also very relevant. The most important is the Espai Barça, which was expected to walk thanks to the works that were to begin once the season was over after obtaining the license for sections of Barcelona City Council and a second bridge loan of 90 million euros. euros from Goldman Sachs. But sources from the Barça club tell ARA that during the month of June that has just ended, only replicate and security works have been carried out. The works announced for this summer inside the stadium have not yet begun and no meetings have been held to discuss them. The forecast was the adaptation of some spaces of the first and second tier, and improvements in the technological infrastructure and around the stadium. And the date of the weekend of August 14, when the official competition will return to the Camp Nou with the start of the League (failing to know if the Joan Gamper Trophy will be played on the 6th after the resignation of Roma) , is getting closer.
Stopped commercial operations
Work is also being accumulated in the offices of the commercial department. Once the sponsorship of Spotify, which came into force on July 1, closed in March, this area of Barça has the direction of continuing to find sponsorships that increase the entity’s income. In this sense, the main asset that remains free is the left sleeve of the game shirt, which has not had a sponsor since Beko resigned last summer. Barça has been receiving offers for cryptocurrencies-related companies (including Polkadot and Binance) for months, but the Laporta board still does not look favorably on them due to the uncertainty in this sector, despite the its economic appeal.
Thus, waiting for a more traditional charming offer, the progress of these negotiations has been frozen, according to sources close to the operations. This situation also means that Barça wants Rakuten to remain linked to Barça as a global sponsor (it would mean between 3 and 5 million euros a year), once the contractual relationship as the main sponsor has ended. Meanwhile, on Thursday night Laporta, satisfied to have closed the operation with Sixth Street, celebrated with the club’s workers an end-of-season dinner at the Velissima, an Italian restaurant overlooking the Barcelona sea.
