As part of their diversification and job creation efforts, States MENA are transformed into a new world professional sports center.
Place your guard for a moment, and you will be cluttered by a sports investment dam in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).
The region’s sports market is ready for an annual growth rate made up of 16.5% (TCAC) from 2023 to 2030, according to the consulting firm Grand View Research. The Qatar sports market is expected to reach $ 3.7 billion this year, according to a white paper of 2024 by the Middle East Sports Investment Forum.
Morocco should co-host the 2030 Football World Cup (with Portugal and Spain), with Saudi Arabia after four years later, almost on the heels of the 2022 edition in Qatar. And Egypt is preparing an offer for the 2036 summer Olympic Games.
With an annual investment of $ 2 billion, the contribution of the sports industry to Saudi GDP should equal $ 16.5 billion per year, or 1.5% of production, by 2030, a report published in December by SurJ Sports Investment, a unit of the Public Investment Fund (PFI), the Kingdom Sovereign Wealth Fund. The market value in the sector is scheduled for $ 22.4 billion at that time, compared to $ 8 billion today, which should result in more than 100,000 jobs.
“It is new, sexy and different from what the stock market,” explains Viktoria Tsvetanova Lightbody, competition lawyer with tonts, a world law firm and director of Badminton Europe, the regional regional body for this sport.
“The Middle East is such a hot market,” explains Marquel Martin, CEO of 3point0 Labs, a sports and entertainment management company that led two boxing games in Riyadh for his then Francis Ngannou, a combatant in mixed martial arts. “There is tremendous growth in sponsorships and leagues.”
The heavy goods vehicles come from the Persian Gulf rich in oil, but markets like Egypt and Morocco strike over their weight. “It’s about everywhere. This is the new Klondike, ”explains Simon Chadwick, a sales consultant specializing in sports and the geopolitical economy, comparing him to the Canadian gold rush at the end of the 19th century.
A tender cascade
To get an idea of the speed, consider these strengths of the first quarter of 2025.
TKO Group Holdings, Parent Company of the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), confirmed the launch of a new boxing organization in partnership with SELA, an event company owned by PFI.
Abu Dhabi welcomed the very first stage of the Middle East of the World Surf League championship, held in an artificial wave pool. The competition was one of the 19 major international events at least with at least 14 different sports this year in four countries: United Arab Emirates (water: in particular, Abu Dhabi and Dubai), Bahrain, Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
Mercedes-AMG, the high performance subsidiary of Mercedes-Benz AG, announced its intention to build a car racing theme park in Qiddiya, Saudi Arabia, working with another PIF subsidiary. He should compete with Ferrari World by Abu Dhabi, who opened in 2010.
NIP Group, an Esports company (video games), signed an agreement of $ 40 million over five years with the Abu Dhabi investment office (ADIDO), a public investment booster agency, to stimulate expansion in the region and worldwide. NIP was formed in 2023 from a merger between the Swedish Esports Ninjas holding in pajamas and the Chinese digital sports group ESV5.
Surj Sports Investment bought a participation in the Dazn Sports Streaming Service based in London, throwing Mena Gauntlet at the Rival of Rival of Qatar BeIN Sports.
Qatar Sports Investments (QSI), a subsidiary of Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), the state sovereign fund, announced the launch of PSG Labs, a high-tech “innovation center” as an extension of its property since 2011 in Paris Saint-Germain Football Club.
Maverick Carter, business partner of the Lebron James basketball legend, has obtained PIF support for a $ 5 billion company to organize a new world professional basketball league, Financial time reported. The agreement recalls the launch in 2022 of the liv supported by PIF, a golf tour which forced a merger last year with the PGA Tour established.
Etihad Airways, the national water airline, announced a multi -year sponsorship agreement with the World Badminton Federation (BWF), starting with the 2025 season.
Still pending in early March, the phenomenon of Moroccan amateur Golf Adam Bresnu was seemed to be prepared with 3 laboratory points. The agent agreement can be symbolic beyond its size as not towards the development of local sports heroes, helping to establish a durable local sports ecosystem in the region by giving local fans “a stable champion to get late”, as Martin said.
Invangering in golf and badminton aside, money tends to be channeled in the three FS: “Fighting, football and fast cars,” notes Chadwick, a fact that can reflect something deeper. “Not that women do not participate, but society is always incredibly male.”
21st Keeping of the century
The Middle East is hardly new in sports. “The struggle, athletics and fencing are from Egypt,” notes Victor Olivereau, a geopolitical consultant specialized in the Middle East and the sports that worked with Peace and Sport, an international organization.
Today’s basic skyscrapers of today was laid in 2013-2017. In 2016, the Saudi crown prince Mohammed Bin Salman pushed the Pif to bend “his financial power in the world, including in the world of sport”. Some mark the start of the current enthusiasm for pioneering investment in Formula 1 (Bahrain), Tennis (Dubai) and the Premier League (Abu Dhabi). The following year, Saudi Arabia launched its ambitious Vision 2030 program.
For MANA economies dependent on hydrocarbons, the official rallying call extends beyond economic growth to diversification for job creation, especially for people entering the labor market. More than 250 million children and young people, newborns at 24, lived in countries in 2023, making around 47% of the population, according to UNICEF. Young unemployment (15-24) in the region was 24.9% the same year, according to the World Bank.
“Diversification through sports can create wealth and jobs,” explains Chadwick.
Another key objective is “the national brand through sport, which acts as a real showcase for a country,” notes Olivereau. After the traces of the United States and the United Kingdom, in particular, but also Brazil (football) and South Korea (K-Pop), the countries of MENA want to “manage their reputation through sport” and other activities such as fashion and music, explains Chadwick.
Public health factors too. State officials hope that a combination of spectator sports and other initiatives that encourage physical activity will reverse a trend that is planning as a world champion who is not conducive to the obesity of young people in 2050, according to a recent article by The Lancet, a great medical newspaper.
Questions remain as to the justification and sustainability that the investment of MENA states in sports will prove to be in the long term. “These states mainly seek political gains, and not economic,” said Olivereau.
Saudi Arabia, for its part, “will not be able to invest, without limit and in this way, over a long period,” he predicts. “When we observe the delays in the construction of the Neom and the revision of the ambitions of the Kingdom in this field, we can legitimately ask ourselves if this massive investment policy will continue beyond 2034.”
So far, the history of the region suggests that “the sums invested are often higher than the advantages generated,” he adds. Take the World Cup in Qatar, which should have cost Qatari authorities $ 200 billion to stage and have generated only $ 20 billion in indirect and investment gains.
“On the other hand, the organization of these events constitutes a vast stimulation for the local economy, in terms of built infrastructure, tourism and others.”
Like the Klondike over a century ago, each participant is not guaranteed to go out.