I have to come clean. The anticipation of college football's upcoming season in front of full stadiums this fall was a natural topic of interest for me having begun my journalism career as a sportswriter in Tampa and Atlanta. So, when our team decided on spotlighting the security and risk challenges of providing safe havens for venues crammed with hundreds of thousands of fans for this month’s cover story, of course, there was only one person for me to contact to get the ball rolling – sorry.
Dr. Lou Marciani is the guru of the sports security and safety industry. He recently retired from his role as Director of The University of Southern Mississippi’s (USM) National Center for Spectator Sports Safety and Security (NCS4). NCS4 is a research center, generating and applying new knowledge in pursuit of understanding safety and security challenges in sport and entertainment. Dr. Lou had served as NCS4 Director since its inception in 2006 following the United States Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) increased effort to defend potential soft targets for terrorism in the wake of 9/11.
But retirement did not mean retreating from this important security vertical market. In 2020, Dr. Marciani, along with co-founders Christopher Kinnan (associate director and COO) and John White (treasurer), launched the Innovation Institute for Fan Experience (IIFX) with the intent of building a global alliance and leading authority in the sports and entertainment industry’s next great leap in fan experience – one steeped in health, safety, security, and service.
Assembling a staff of visionary thought leaders, subject matter experts, and advanced practitioners throughout the international community, the Innovation Institute’s vision is to be the leading and most trusted global authority on providing exceptional fan experience for sports and entertainment. According to Dr. Marciani and Kinnan, the organization’s mission is to create the ideal fan experience for its members and partners resulting in measurable revenue growth, new and repeat attendance, workforce professional growth and development, and maximized health, safety, and security through best practices, innovative technology solutions, and high-quality services.
Return to Work, Play, and Spectate Task Force
The timing of the organization’s launch in April 2020 as the COVID-19 crisis exploded, provided the IIFX Task Force a chance to step up early in the pandemic by recognizing the risks posed and opportunities available to the sports and entertainment industry. Taskforce members are a cross-section of thought leaders, technical and medical experts, technologists, futurists, lawyers, insurance experts, and representatives that run the gamut of venues across the entertainment world, professional sports, intercollegiate and interscholastic athletics to endurance events and theme parks.
The Task Force’s work to date has resulted in the publication, Principles to Guide the Return to Work, Play, and Spectate - Preparing for Full Capacity Sport and Entertainment Venue Operations (https://iifx.org/principles-guide/). The Task Force continues to evaluate new information about COVID-19 and its variants and is examining the effects of rapid testing, vaccines, and new technologies on industry operations. The lessons learned are the basis for future publications about resilience, education and training, revenue generation, and other areas of impact.
This past July, the organization launched the Xperience Consortium, which is an IIFX technology network of enterprises and startups to help create the next leap forward in sports and entertainment fan experience. The Xperience Consortium’s mission is to advocate the deployment of innovative and relevant technology to enhance the sports and entertainment landscape by assisting industry organizations to create a greater fan experience, access revenue growing services, maximize security and public health safety, and physically and digitally connect even more with fans.
“The Consortium is a global sports and entertainment industry resource, one that tracks technology trends and industry gaps while identifying companies, consultancies, and technologies that can help address current and emerging challenges to sports and entrainment business operations,” says Dr. Marciani. The founding Xperience Consortium Board of Trustees includes Axis Communications, Intel, Johnson Controls, NTT and Microsoft. “It takes all of us. If we combine the technology and resources of our Xperience Board of Trustee’s executive leadership to steer the establishment and implementation of a global macro sports and entertainment platform combined with our Gold and Silver Partners with innovative thinking across the board – from entrepreneurial ventures and small to mid-sized companies to the larger ones, innovation magic will happen in our midst.”
