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Description
I have been actively involved in the development of today’s sports business industry for more than 40 years. Concentrating my marketing skills on the subject of sport, I helped reinvent many traditional events into sophisticated vehicles through which companies could achieve kudos and exposure. I am therefore widely acknowledged as the ‘founding father’ of modern sports marketing.
Born in 1947 I started my career in business as a messenger boy before founding the West Nally Group in 1969 with BBC presenter and sports commentator Peter West as a PR agency with a specialised sporting events mandate. After early successes, it is 1976, on brokering an agreement to sponsor the FIFA World Cup, when the company assured its reputation as a leading innovator within the sports marketing field. Employing over 400 staff in 14 offices across 11 countries in its heyday in the 80s and 90s, West Nally has served as partner to, among others, the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA), the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF).
In 2009 I took up the lead in promoting poker as a mind sport on a global stage. As the current President of the International Federation of Poker (IFP), it is my intention to champion poker as a game of strategic skill. With more than 50 member nations IFP promotes its unique Match Poker format, which eliminates the luck of draw and utilises smartphones instead of physical cards.
For some years, I have also been working with the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to assist in establishing relationships with international sport federations and explore ways of using sport as a portal for education.
I am also a lecturer and touring fellow of the World Academy of Sport and a former Academic Director of the IE Business School in Madrid’s Master in Sports Management teaching the use of sport as the ultimate communication medium.