FIFA, the world’s most recognized football governing body, announced yesterday its partnership with Avalanche to develop a dedicated blockchain network. The custom Layer-1 (L1) solution aims to revolutionize fan engagement and digital collectibles for the organization’s estimated five billion global supporters.
The partnership follows Avalanche’s significant Avalanche9000 upgrade to draw developers and promote the development of unique L1 blockchains.
Through the agreement, the company transitions from disparate third-party systems to a single, purpose-built system. Before the 2022 Qatar World Cup, FIFA had made NFT collections available on the Algorand blockchain; nevertheless, this new project demonstrates a more thorough dedication to blockchain technology.
The FIFA Blockchain will use the architecture of Avalanche, which permits the creation of sovereign networks designed for high throughput and low latency while retaining complete governance control. These networks operate independently, but remain fully interoperable with the broader Avalanche ecosystem and the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) standard.
FIFA Collect Migrates to New Blockchain
FIFA Collect, the existing NFT marketplace and collection, will migrate to the new Avalanche-powered blockchain. Users will now connect via MetaMask or other EVM wallets that support WalletConnect, replacing their previous use of Algorand-based wallets like Pera and Defly.
The agreement expands FIFA’s growing blockchain portfolio, including FIFA Rivals, a free-to-play mobile soccer game introduced in November 2024 and developed in association with Mythical Games. It also follows Avalanche’s significant Avalanche9000 upgrade, which aimed to draw developers and promote the development of customized L1 blockchains.
FIFA’s ongoing investment in blockchain infrastructure indicates significant institutional faith in the technology’s long-term potential, even during the downturn of the NFT market known as the crypto winter.
While FIFA has only revealed plans for its digital collectibles marketplace so far, the organization hinted that “future plans and business cases are planned but not yet publicly disclosed,” suggesting a broader Web3 strategy may be in development.
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