Charlotte van Tuyckom, researcher and teacher at the Howest School of Applied Sciences from Bruges, spoke about Gen Z behaviours ©smartcities

The second day of the smartcities & sport summit focused on the future - with young people and technology in the industry dominating discussion here.

Opening discussion was Charlotte van Tuyckom, researcher and teacher at the Howest School of Applied Sciences from Bruges, put definition to the term "Gen Z", which she categorises as anyone born between 1995 and 2011.

Her advice to sports organisations was to focus on shorter and more eye-catching content, saying Gen Z generally had an attention span to be drawn in to a product of just eight seconds.

She also made it clear this generation had grown up around the online world their whole life, that they work off tablets, phones and laptops rather than television, and they cared about issues such as mental health, diversity and inclusion.

This was then linked to how different personality types in this generation could be paired to the type of sportsperson they are, or not.

From there, Van Tuyckom recommended social motivation, positive feedback and to continue to make sport more accessible.

"Sports has a Gen Z opportunity, not a problem," she concluded.

Youth events was the next topic of discussion, with International Hockey Federation senior communications manager Nicolas Maingot and World DanceSport Federation general secretary Sergey Nifontov presenting successes in Hockey5s and breaking events. 

Later, a panel was held on the metaverse, with individuals speaking about the future of sport and its relationship with technology.

Metaverse was among the topics discussed in Lausanne ©smartcities
Metaverse was among the topics discussed in Lausanne ©smartcities

Futurist at the Copenhagen Institute for Futures Studies, Bugge Holm Hansen, discussed the future of sport with a focus on the metaverse playing into the industry more.

Over the next 10 years he is expecting tactical, strategic, vision and disruption stages; adding that "the average person might spend up to six hours a day in metaverse experiences by 2030".

He was followed by Lucy Mills, co-founder of new-age web education organisation Ready, added her thoughts on the sports industry and the metaverse being equitable for women.

"Who is designing the metaverse, and are they inclusive?" she queried.

Finally, LaLiga international delegate Jaime Navarro spoke of the several ways the Spanish league was involved in NFTs and the metaverse, mentioning their new partnership with Minecraft and its fantasy league format on Sorare.