Polkadot Could Become FC Barcelona’s Official Jersey Sponsor

The Spanish soccer club FC Barcelona might team up with the blockchain protocol Polkadot. Assuming the two sides shake hands, the latter will become an official jersey sponsor of the team.

Polkadot Eyeing The Soccer World

The players of Football Club Barcelona currently wear the Rakuten logo on their jersey as the Japanese e-commerce firm is the official sponsor of the club. However, the partnership between the two entities is due in July this year, and the soccer team is seeking to ink a deal with a new organization.

According to a recent announcement, one of the options is Polkadot – a blockchain network, which was established in 2016 but gained more traction last year. FC Barcelona described the protocol as a platform that allows a “high number of transactions by second.” Specifically, the project can perform 1,000 TPS. Once it becomes fully operational, it is expected to increase to 1,000,000.

Barça’s other possible partner is the digital music streaming service Spotify. The Spanish team revealed it will thoroughly examine the options and choose the sponsor responding to its long-term strategy:

“The club has decided to take things with patience to analyze in-depth each proposal in procures to reach the most profitable agreement on a long-term basis.”

FC Barcelona is not a newbie in the digital asset industry. A few months ago, the team signed a global partnership with the NFT marketplace Ownix to release a non-fungible collection for its fans. Shortly after, though, the club canceled the agreement as Moshe Hogeg (who is related to Ownix) was arrested for several offenses such as fraud and sexual assault.

Polkadot’s Progress in 2021

The reason why the blockchain protocol received a great deal of attention is because of its innovative parachain approach. Simply put, this feature allows the connection of different blockchains to each other. It also enables users to build a blockchain with their Substrate framework and bridges Polkadot’s network with other projects such as Ethereum and Bitcoin.

In November last year, the team behind the protocol launched its first Parachain slot Auction. It relied on Kusama to test out the concept at length.

Earlier this month, the smart contract platform Moonbeam became the first fully operational parachain on Polkadot. It plans to bring several new integrations, activities, and users to boost the Polkadot ecosystem and contribute to the growth of the network.