SecuTix will license its ticketing software to UEFA until 2021. The agreement includes the Euro 2020, the Champions League and Europa League finals, the Super Cup as well as the Nations League finals in 2019 and 2021.
The Euro 2020 will see 24 teams competing in 51 matches across 12 stadiums in Europe, located in five different time zones. UEFA expects to sell three million tickets, which doesn’t even begin to cover the expected demand generated by tens of millions of soccer fans each tournament.
SecuTix’s software is going to handle all ticket applications, lotteries, sales and payments, and provide UEFA’s only authorized resale platform, on which tickets can be resold from fans to fans. UEFA’s resale policy is “very simple,” according to Frédéric Longatte, CEO at SecuTix. He told Pollstar, “You aren’t allowed to resell UEFA tickets on third-party platforms, whether that’s Euro, Champions or Europa League.”
One fundamental difference between selling tickets for a major soccer tournament such as the Euro or Champions League as opposed to other live entertainment events, is the fact that seats are allocated after the sale of the ticket. This has multiple reasons. One is the strong over-demand, which makes ticket lotteries the fairest way to allocate tickets. In other cases, customers can choose a seat category, but the tournament’s organizers are going to seat them, for example according to the team they follow. Longatte said that this was where “most of the complexity arises from an operational standpoint.”
To gain access to tickets, people require an UEFA account. Sometimes customers from a certain country are first asked to register with the soccer federation of their particular country before registering with UEFA – which is how the soccer federations of each country get hold of fans’ data to be able to reward their most loyal supporters.
One practical way of using this data occurred during the Euro 2016, when Iceland unexpectedly eliminated England during round 16. Many English fans had bought so-called Follow My Team tickets, which granted them access to a pre-determined number of England matches. These tickets were conditional during the knock-out stages, and fans were entitled to reimbursement, should their team not make it to a stage promised on the tickets. Thus, a lot of seats became available for the quarterfinal match against France.
SecuTix’s software allows for tickets to be reserved for the fans of the teams playing, and it knew from the initial ticket lottery, who the Icelandic fans were. Many of them now had a chance to get a ticket and see their team continue defy the competition (Iceland lost to France in the quarter final).
Said Longatte: “We’re very proud to extend our relationship with UEFA. The appointment is proof that our agile technologies can rise to the challenge set by high-demand events across different venues with varying access systems. We will build upon our position as UEFA’s trusted ticketing system provider to help strengthen their fan relationships and offer fans a fair and transparent ticketing system.”
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