World IP Day: How to maximise intellectual property on the global sporting stage

Effective protection, enforcement and commercialisation of IP are central to building and monetising brand value on the sports stage, a message that feels especially timely as World IP Day on 26 April celebrates IP’s role in innovation, creativity and economic growth

This year’s theme, ’IP and sport;, shines a spotlight on how intellectual property (IP) underpins the global sports industry to incentivise future innovation and to continue to improve the overall experience of athletes, teams and fans. IP is critical in everything from team brands, sponsorship and broadcasting, to innovative apparel, equipment and technologies, merchandise and fan engagement.

With the 2026 FIFA World Cup coming up later this year companies operating in sports need to be aware of some IP and commercial considerations when it comes to global tournaments and the opportunities and challenges they present. 

The World Cup is a huge branding and advertising opportunity for companies. It is therefore essential for them to carefully consider how to extract maximum commercial value from their IP assets and what to protect and how. They should also be thinking about their enforcement strategy and how to measure return on investment (ROI) on activity.

What assets are you protecting?

Companies need to decide which elements of the brand to feature at the event and how the brand will be shown to consumers – for instance, digitally, in and around stadiums, on screen during broadcasts and on the athletes themselves. This helps identify which ‘core branding’ elements that should be protected, such as the name, logo, slogan and specific colours.

The core technology, brand and any other relevant sub brand elements should be adequately protected in the host country of the tournament. Often this will be via registered trade marks but can also extend to unregistered rights such as copyright for any unregistered logos and slogans and images and goodwill.

This year’s World Cup provides an added challenge as it is being hosted by three countries - the USA, Canada and Mexico. So brands must ensure they have registered assets, and have taken local advice in respect to those assets, in all three countries.

Patents should protect innovative equipment, shoes and clothing, as well as wearable performance tracking devices which are now commonly used by athletes.

Given the enormous interest in large-scale sporting events like the World Cup, the implementation of innovative technologies - such as video assistant referee (VAR) technology, which is now viewed as essential to assist in adjudicating potentially controversial decisions - should be adequately protected by patents across the globe, but in particular in the host countries.

Such technologies are developing at a pace, with new tools often implemented on a wide-scale basis for the first time at international sporting events. These advancements often raise public interest and generate headlines because they are often shown by broadcasters and have an immediate impact, enhancing spectator engagement and experiences.

It is therefore essential that the correct protection has been secured well in advance of the tournament, again with innovators ensuring that appropriate local advice has been obtained.

Where are you enforcing rights?

High profile tournaments such as the World Cup bring a lot of buzz and activity. The natural consequence is that third parties will also try to exploit this opportunity, meaning rights holders must remain vigilant in both the real and online world.

In the real world, this will manifest itself in the need for rights holders to respond to infringers inside and outside of the stadium and locally to the city hosting the match. This can be ambush campaigns within the stands, or street vendors selling infringing merchandise outside, and monitoring the use of equipment by athletes and teams, and technologies both within the stadium and by broadcasters.

Online, issues can arise from unauthorised social media posts which suggest a link to, or otherwise seek to harm, the brand or more sophisticated advertising campaigns from competitors seeking to connect themselves to the tournament without having paid for the right to do so.

Rights holders must ensure that they have a robust monitoring strategy in place that considers both real world and online concerns, integrating on-site rapid response teams, which may include legal experts, advanced online monitoring and enforcement tools, and specialist third party enforcement agencies to ensure immediate and efficient responses, and to gather robust evidence of potentially infringing activities.

What are the potential implications?

With the world’s eyes watching, rights holders must be careful of how any action they decide to take against infringers could be perceived by a global audience.
Taking an overly aggressive approach could generate negative publicity and perceptions of bullying. SPeed matters during an event and detailed legal letters which require careful consideration often slow things down.

Rights holders will need to strike a balance between protecting their rights and engaging with infringers in a proportionate and measured manner. This might involve issuing lighter touch cease and desist letters or messages via social media platforms before escalating to formal legal action or working collaboratively with the organisers and local authorities to address infringements around the stadium discreetly and quickly.

By adopting a nuanced approach, brands can maintain their reputation and achieve fast results. ROI can be measured through speed of results and through feedback from stakeholders.

Where the risk to reputation and revenue outweighs other considerations, it may be necessary to seek a preliminary injunction to immediately stop allegedly infringing activities. In some countries, these can be obtained very quickly, sometimes within hours, and provide rights holders with immediate relief until a full trial can be held or settlement obtained.

Commercialising sporting rights on the global stage

The World Cup will span North America via 16 host cities and will be the largest football tournament in history. This scale creates extraordinary commercial opportunity for companies to showcase innovation, reach global audiences and deepen fan engagement. However, the complexity and regulatory intensity of events of this nature mean that the commercialisation of sporting rights requires careful contractual planning well in advance of the tournament’s first kick off.

Commercial rights are typically defined by a patchwork of agreements covering sponsorship, merchandising, licensing, marketing and broadcast-related rights, spread between event organisers, teams, athletes, broadcasters and regional partners.

A clear mapping exercise is therefore essential, and companies should begin by thinking about which rights they want to exploit. They should narrow down that list by identifying which rights they are entitled to exploit. And the list should be further trimmed by a practical and measured analysis of how such rights will be exploited.

Sponsorship remains one of the most powerful tools for brands seeking visibility at major events. Gone are the days however where sponsorship arrangements enjoyed absolute exclusivity, with rights-holders retaining flexibility to appoint sponsors across different categories, territories and platforms.

Brands should pay close attention to how sponsorship arrangements define ‘categories’, ‘designations'”’and ‘competing products’ and how activation rights interact with local laws, venue regulations and event rules. Critically, brands should scrutinise not only what they are getting, but especially what they are not getting.

Restrictions around ambush marketing, clean zones and ticketing terms can significantly limit how and where branding can be displayed. This is a tricky area, and brands will need to play peacemaker between their legal and marketing teams to ensure contractual principles align with campaign implementation and activation.

In an evolving content consumption landscape, broadcast and media rights continue to lie at the heart of the sports economy for flagship events like the World Cup. While broadcasters hold primary transmission rights, brands should increasingly seek to align themselves with broadcast content through advertising, co‑branded programming, digital integrations and social media activations.

In doing so, companies need to navigate a complex web of contractual restrictions. Use of event footage, highlights or player images is tightly controlled, with usage varying by platform, territory and timing. Short form digital content, influencer marketing and real‑time social media engagement – important content creation channels in the TikTok and Instagram Reels age – raise particular challenges, with brands having to balance editorial control with the need for speed, virality and agility.

Product placement within broadcast content may also be subject to additional regulation. In the UK, Ofcom's Broadcasting Code imposes specific rules on when and how product placement is permitted. Brands activating around broadcasts for events like the World Cup must ensure commercial arrangements are structured to comply with broadcasting laws, and that responsibility for securing clearances is clearly allocated in underlying contracts. Clear contractual permissions and robust internal sign‑off processes are essential to avoid inadvertent infringement of laws or third-party rights.

For many brands, major sporting events also provide a launchpad for limited edition products or event‑specific merchandise. Commercial agreements must account not only for IP and branding rights, but also for manufacturing, distribution and logistics, while always balancing against supply chain risk. Contracts must address what happens when things go wrong. Termination rights, force majeure, indemnities against third-party IP claims, and provisions dealing with unsold stock or inactivated rights are all areas where careful drafting makes a material difference.

In short, while the commercial opportunities surrounding events like the World Cup are unrivalled, success hinges on early, integrated legal planning. By aligning commercial contracts, IP strategy and operational delivery, brands can maximise impact while managing risk on the world’s biggest sporting stage.

World IP Day 2026 highlights how innovation lies at the heart of modern sport, with intellectual property acting as a key driver of growth and differentiation. For brands operating on a global sporting stage, the next step is proactive planning: reviewing IP assets, contractual rights and enforcement strategies early, and ensuring legal and commercial teams are aligned. Done well, this supports innovation, maximises opportunity and protects long term brand value on and off the field.

Aumair Qayum and Uzair Patel of Pinsent Masons contributed to this feature.