In an interview with Techwich founder Rasool Seyghaly, Albert Mundet Bolós, Manager at Barça Innovation Hub, explains how the club is applying artificial intelligence to solve real problems across stadium operations, fan engagement, content workflows, and sports medicine.
By Rasool Seyghaly, Founder of Techwich
In a recent interview I conducted for Techwich, I spoke with Albert Mundet Bolós, Manager at Barça Innovation Hub, about how FC Barcelona is approaching artificial intelligence in a way that goes far beyond experimentation.
What stood out most in our conversation was that, for Barça, AI is not being treated as a showcase technology. It is being integrated into real workflows, real decisions, and real business challenges. From stadium operations to fan personalization, from content production to sports medicine, the club’s focus is clearly on practical value rather than hype.
AI starts with a real problem
One of the first topics we discussed was the club’s work around a digital twin of the stadium. Albert explained that the project is built on multiple data sources, including access control, ticketing, and city mobility patterns. The objective is not to create a flashy demonstration, but to help operations teams better understand and predict crowd movement inside the venue.
The practical value is straightforward: if crowd flows can be simulated before congestion happens, operational teams can make better decisions earlier. In that context, AI becomes genuinely useful. It helps reduce friction, improve movement, and support more effective crowd management.
What I found especially interesting is that this way of thinking does not stop at the stadium. Albert also pointed out that the same digital twin logic can be applied to athletes, enabling data-driven simulations that support better decision-making around performance, readiness, and preparation.
Fans are not just customers
A very important distinction Albert made during our conversation is that a football fan is not the same as a standard customer.
A fan has emotional attachment, identity, loyalty, and a deep sense of community tied to the club. Because of that, personalization in sports has to go further than product recommendations or sales optimization. The ambition at Barça is to understand each fan as a unique individual and create interactions that feel more personal, relevant, and meaningful.
That, in my view, is one of the most important uses of AI in sports and entertainment. Not personalization for the sake of automation, but personalization that respects the emotional relationship between the club and the fan.
Albert was also clear that this kind of transformation does not happen overnight. Enterprise adoption of AI takes time. The right sequence, as he described it, is to first define the real problem, then identify the technology that can solve it, and only then scale it in a measurable and cost-effective way.
A practical use case in content and sponsorship
We also discussed a concrete example that reflects how Barça Innovation Hub thinks about AI in practice.
Albert mentioned an investment in a Polish company working on AI-driven product placement for existing content. This addresses a very real media and commercial challenge. Clubs often have large libraries of valuable content, but reshooting with players to update sponsor visibility can be expensive, slow, and sometimes not even possible.
With AI, sponsor elements can be integrated into existing content more efficiently. That reduces production time and cost while helping the club deliver greater value to partners. It is a simple example, but a powerful one, because it shows AI being used exactly where it can improve execution immediately.
Injury prevention must become more personal
Another key part of our discussion focused on sports medicine and injury prevention.
Albert argued that traditional models often rely too heavily on generalized load metrics, especially the common acute versus chronic workload approach. The limitation is obvious: these models often assume that athletes respond to physical stress in similar ways, when in reality that is not the case.
The direction Barça is exploring is far more personalized. By combining physiological, medical, psychological, and match-related data, the club aims to build a more individualized injury-risk view for each player.
That does not mean AI makes the final decision. Albert made it clear that coaching and performance staff remain in control. The role of AI is to provide better data, better scoring, and better context for decision-making. In elite sport, risk never disappears, but the ability to understand and manage it can improve significantly.
To me, that is the right way to think about AI in high-performance environments: not as a replacement for expert judgment, but as a tool to strengthen it.
Why Barça invests, not only collaborates
One of the most valuable parts of the interview was understanding why Barça Innovation Hub also acts as an investor.
Albert explained that FC Barcelona already knows how to operate in areas such as ticketing, merchandising, and sponsorship. But in fields such as health, sports medicine, and advanced technology, the club can often create more value by helping accelerate strong startups rather than trying to build everything internally.
That is why their investment thesis is not limited to companies that are only useful for Barça itself. They are looking for solutions that can scale beyond the club and serve broader markets.
This is an important distinction. They are not simply searching for internal tools. They are looking for companies with real market potential, strong teams, and a clear value proposition.
Albert also highlighted several non-negotiables in their evaluation process: the company must align with Barça’s values, there must be a visible path to return on investment for the customer, and the solution must make sense beyond brand prestige alone.
That kind of discipline is especially important in sports tech, where it is easy to get distracted by hype.
Barcelona as a sports innovation hub
We also touched on the broader innovation ecosystem around the club.
Albert sees Barcelona as a strong base for sports-related innovation because of its combination of hospitals, biomedical infrastructure, research capacity, talent, and global visibility. At the same time, Barça Innovation Hub does not operate with a local-only mindset. Its investment lens is global.
The portfolio already includes companies from multiple countries, and what matters most is whether the solution is strong enough and whether Barça can meaningfully help accelerate it.
That global approach makes sense. If the ambition is to shape the future of sport and performance, the search for innovation cannot remain limited to one geography.
My takeaway
What I took away from this conversation is that FC Barcelona’s AI strategy is grounded in something very simple, but very important: usefulness.
AI is being applied where it can improve decision-making, reduce friction, lower costs, personalize experiences, and support better outcomes for both the club and its wider ecosystem.
The digital twin work improves stadium operations. Personalization strengthens the fan relationship. AI-assisted content workflows improve commercial execution. Data-driven risk models support sports medicine. And investment in startups helps move useful innovation into the market faster.
That is a much stronger model than treating AI as a passing trend.
It is also a reminder that the most interesting organizations right now are not necessarily the ones talking the most about artificial intelligence. They are the ones quietly embedding it into everyday operations, one real use case at a time.
Leave a Reply