Stickers are back in the football world. But this time they are virtual, not physical. And Sorare, the company behind it, is a platform that has just accomplished what it started doing a few years ago: getting licenses from all the major leagues.

Sorare announced today Agreement with the Premier League for several years in an undisclosed multi-million dollar deal. It is an alliance with the world’s largest football league, the only league that does not yet exist among its collaborators.

The French platform for the sale of virtual trading cards that invest in key football players such as Lionel Messi or Antoine Griezmann already works with more than 300 clubs worldwide and five European leagues, including LaLiga. to them.

Five major leagues have already embraced Sorare

As explained by the Financial Times, company will pay “tens of millions of pounds” to Premier League to secure rights. In return, the English football league will own a percentage of Sorare’s future shares. A company with a final valuation of approximately $4.3 billion in 2021.

The platform allows weekly alignments and there is no cost to sign up. Although there is a possibility that certain players can trade their virtual cards to create the best lineup. The technology behind these virtual cards is NFT, but since Sorare they have tried to move away from this terminology and have not used it for their service.

As Sorare’s CEO and co-founder Nicolas Julia explains, his platform has more than 3 million users. Besides football leagues Sorare owns the rights of the NBA and MLB. for the sale of virtual trading cards.

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— Gerard Pique (@3gerardpique) January 30, 2023

While the crypto industry isn’t having a good time, Sorare has found its niche in the soccer world’s virtual collecting spree. If they had revenues of around 270 million euros in 2021, They grew 50% in 2022 Approaching 500 million euros.

One of the criticisms of this platform is its relationship with gambling and betting. This deal is under review by UK regulators to confirm that it does not pose a risk.

Sorare has become the main platform for virtual card exchange. The only thing missing to deliver a complete experience was the alliance with the Premier League. Currently, if you want a virtual sticker of a football player in Europe, you will probably be in Sorare.

a Domain name similar to the physical football stickers Panini has. In fact, for the 2022/2023 Santander League, Panini himself published his own NFT collection, but the coverage achieved is far from Sorare’s. Forms have changed, what looks the same is the desire to bring together the best players.

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