FC Barcelona’s content creation unit set for New York listing

FC Barcelona has revealed plans to spin off its content creation business in the US via a blank-check merger and an initial public offering. 

The Spanish football giant said on Friday that the special purpose acquisition company Mountain & Co had agreed to take its Barca Media arm public on the Nasdaq.

It said the tie-up would value the combined business at approximately $1billion (£790million) and help it gain access to capital that can be used to fund original content. 

Following the deal, expected to be finalised in the fourth quarter of 2023, Barc Media will be led by Toni Cruz, a long-time Spanish media industry executive. 

The division is responsible for producing all audio-visual, digital and e-sports content, ranging from interviews to highlights, and is distributed via the football club’s social media channels.

Barcelona is not just one of the world’s most valuable sports teams but has one of the largest social media followings, with 122 million followers on Instagram.

It was also the first football club to surpass more than 15 million subscribers on YouTube.

Joan Laporta, President of FC Barcelona, said Barca Media’s content ‘has proven extremely valuable, resonating well and driving meaningful engagement with our growing global fanbase while generating new revenue streams’.

He added: ‘This step is a strategic decision that will give us additional resources to continue to grow the platform at a time when the demand for sports-themed digital content is expanding exponentially.’

Barcelona also announced on Friday that it would sell a minority stake in technology platform Barca Vision to LIBERO Football Finance for €120million.

This comes two days after the Catalonian side agreed to sell a 49 per cent holding in Barca Studios to Mexican private equity firm Mountain Nazca for £155.3million, subject to La Liga’s approval. 

Since Laporta was re-elected as Barcelona’s president two years ago, he has sought to get the club’s finances under sounder financial footing.

Years of extravagant transfer spending, wage bills, and plunging attendance numbers during the Covid-19 pandemic left the club nursing debts of more than $1.4billion by the time Laporta arrived.

During his tenure, Barcelona has sold a 25 per cent stake in its media rights for 25 years to American investment firm Sixth Street and made a record £236million sponsorship deal with the music streaming service Spotify.

Yet despite all these deals, the club’s economic vice-president Eduard Romeo confessed in a June press conference that its debts remained the same as when Laporta took over in March 2021.