The Record - Issue 19: Winter 2020

83 COMMUN I CAT I ONS & MED I A “I feel very blessed to be sitting here today with ONE Championship in this position. The ride has been really crazy but technology is what has driven it.” In July 2020, ONE Championship entered into a partnership with Microsoft to deliver new dig- ital experiences to its fans. As part of this, ONE Championship is now using the Microsoft cloud – including Azure andMicrosoft 365 – to increase fan engagement and staff collaboration. With technology at its core, Sityodtong believes that Microsoft will help take the brand even further. “It’s tremendous to be involved with Microsoft,” he says. “The company takes sports very seriously, and we’re very fortunate to now benefit from its resources and expertise. Our partnership is about reimagining the whole fan experience through various technologies but also being extremely data-driven. Having a partner like Microsoft is going to unleash our true potential in surprising and delighting our fans all over the world. “It is my dream to unite the world by inspir- ing individuals with the stories of our heroes, celebrating values of integrity, humility, honour, respect, courage, discipline and compassion, and changing the world through these values. But you can only do that when you have tremendous data and analytics, and when you have technol- ogy in every part of your production, marketing and sales processes. Microsoft is the comprehen- sive technology partner that will unlock ONE Championship’s true potential globally.” According to IDC, the amount of data in the world will grow 61 per cent to 175 zettabytes by 2025. With a primary application of artificial intelligence being the analysis and understand- ing of data, its role will become increasingly important in the future, as Sityodtong is already noticing. “Technology and AI enable us to harness the power of data, make sense of it and then leverage its predictive patterns,” he says. “We can do this during the production of our live show, moving cameras, getting the best angles and captur- ing those moments that resonate with the fans. Working with Microsoft and having this part- nership taken seriously at the highest levels is so exciting for us.”