UP201: EA Sports, FIFA and women

For people under 30, FIFA is a computer game not a governing body. That’s become almost a cliche of sports marketing, and like all cliches, there might be some truth in it. Which is why the noises recently coming from EA Sports, the company which makes the game, are so interesting. There’s talk of a split between the governing body which licenses its name for around $150million a year and the company that is said to have turned that license in to $20billion over the past two decades. Our guest today is David Jackson, the Everton supporting former Barclays marketer who is in charge of the FIFA brand for EA Sports. We obviously talk about the current licensing story and much more besides, including the marketing potential of women players as cover stars of the FIFA game.  Listen to to the rest of the Unofficial Partner achieve by subscribing via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts or via your favourite podcast app. You’ll also need to get the weekly Unofficial Partner newsletter, which goes to the email inbox of thousands of sports business executives out every Thursday, subscribe via unofficialpartner.comUnofficial Partner is the leading podcast for the business of sport. A mix of entertaining and thought provoking conversations with a who's who of the global industry. To join our community of listeners, sign up to the weekly UP Newsletter and follow us on Twitter and TikTok at @UnofficialPartnerWe publish two podcasts each week, on Tuesday and Friday. These are deep conversations with smart people from inside and outside sport. Our entire back catalogue of 500 sports business conversations are available free of charge here. Each pod is available by searching for ‘Unofficial Partner’ on Apple, Spotify and every podcast app. If you’re interested in collaborating with Unofficial Partner to create one-off podcasts or series and live events, you can reach us via the website.