ITOCHU Corporation (headquartered in Minato-ku, Tokyo; Keita Ishii, President & COO; hereinafter “ITOCHU”) announced today that it has entered into a business alliance with MIXI, Inc. (headquartered in Shibuya-ku, Tokyo; Koki Kimura, Representative Director, President and CEO; hereinafter “MIXI”).

The market for the sports industry in Japan is expanding, with the Japan Sports Agency setting a goal of reaching 15 trillion yen by 2025*¹. At the same time, individual athletes and those in minor sports do not receive enough funding for their activities, and it is very important to gain fans to develop the industry. In March 2021, ITOCHU launched CiRCuSFan*², a website helping athletes and sports teams build their fan bases with the goal of expanding the domestic sports market and improving the sports environment in Japan, helping over 100 athletes and teams to gain fans and improve their fan engagement.
CiRCuSFan：https://circus.fan/

Since April 2022, MIXI has offered Unlim MEMBERSHIP, a subscription-based service to connect athletes and fans, and like ITOCHU's CiRCuSFan, MIXI is committed to developing a fan community centered on athletes. ITOCHU is also contributing to the development of the sports industry by making the managing companies of the professional soccer team F.C. TOKYO and the professional basketball team Chiba Jets into Group subsidiaries.
ITOCHU and MIXI have entered into a business alliance in the sports fan engagement business, aiming to transform the business and contribute to the market through the use of digital technology in the sports industry. ITOCHU specifically aims to expand its business performance further through providing OEM support to MIXI for its CiRCuSFan system, production and sales support for athlete and sports team merchandise, and in providing proposals and services for new customer experiences in sports utilizing smart stadiums, the metaverse, and other digital technologies.

This initiative will transform the business and contribute to the market by utilizing IT in the sports industry, and corresponds with the Basic Policy of "realizing business transformation by shifting to a market-oriented perspective" from the Medium-term Management Plan. Moving forward, ITOCHU will contribute to the expansion of the domestic sports market over the medium to long term through the provision of consulting services to build fan engagement with sports associations and sports teams and support for their DX in collaboration with ITOCHU Group and partner companies, in addition to the promotion of the fan engagement business with MIXI.