Awards, commissions and resignations: how and with whom does Barça deal?

Barcelona2025 was a busy New Year's Eve at Can Barça. On December 31, the activity in Arístides Maillol's offices was frenetic until almost the time to eat the grapes. The deadline to register Dani Olmo and Pau Víctor beyond the provisional period was running out and deals had to be closed in a hurry to prevent the players from being released. The picture of other hasty closures was therefore repeated, most of them with a happy ending for Joan Laporta's interests. This time, however, the Barcelona president hit his toes. The documentation presented to the League to collect the sale of nearly 500 seats VIP was not validated in time and the RFEF did not renew its licenses. Only one The precautionary measure granted by the Higher Sports Council (CSD) saved the furniture, something that Laporta celebrated by making sausages and shouting in the box of the Saudi Arabia stadium where Hansi Flick's team would end up lifting the Super Cup.

Days later, the president of Barça continued to release the tension in a press conference in which he fired at critics of his management. However, in that appearance he did not specify which companies he had transferred part of the seats to. VIP of the future Camp Nou for 100 million. Nor did he explain why it took so long for the League to validate the small print of two operations that injected 100 million at once in exchange for selling a small piece of assets for 30 years.

Newly founded Arab companies

In line with Laporta, official sources at Barça are hiding behind "confidentiality" to avoid revealing the names of the investors and the amounts paid. The statement made available to members did not explain much more about a product, personal seat licenses, which the club had approved to sell to a solvent company like Legends, already known in the noble offices of the Blaugrana.

In the autumn of 2024, the Legends route came to a standstill in favour of two companies with partners or their Arabs; hence Laporta's recent trips to Dubai and Qatar for matters that, at the time, were defined by his entourage as "private". A transaction was closed for 30 million euros with Forta Advisors Limited, a company created in London in May 2024 - that is, with no proven activity prior to the purchase of the seats VIP— by two Qataris, one of them from the family that governs the emirate. Although La Liga requested guarantees for the money before December 31, these did not enter Barça's accounts until January 3, a delay that contributed to the problems with Olmo and Víctor. Sources close to Laporta's board assure that Pini Zahavi, representative of Hansi Flick and Robert Lewandowski, and a friend of the Barça president, has received 5% of this operation with Forta.

But to reach the 100 million needed to resolve the impasse, another 70 million were still needed. This amount came from another company recently founded in Dubai, the emirate that Laporta obtained a few months ago. the golden visa. Of the 70 million, the League asked for 40% in the entity's accounts to avoid non-payments like those of Barça Vision. 28 million that, like those of the Qataris, did not arrive until the beginning of 2025, with the deadlines to re-register Olmo and Víctor already expired.

Anonymous and German businessmen who do not pay

Signing players has been one of Laporta's priorities since he returned to the presidency of Barça. However, in this second term he has had to fight against the restrictive economic control regulations of the League. In one of the loopholes linked to the famous fair play Financially, with Lewandowski signed but not registered, the club sold what is now known as Barça Vision for 200 million to investors who never believed in the project and others who simply did not pay a single euro. Currently, the payments are still not up to date and, in terms of accounting, the black hole caused problems with the auditor, to which the entity has ended up changing.

A small company based in Sant Andreu

In addition to dealing with companies that want a part of its business, Barça also talks to service providers that it needs to function on a day-to-day basis. Companies that it hires to carry out specific tasks; from catering for La Masia athletes to services linked to the future Camp Nou. Related to the latter, the institution announced on November 21 an agreement with New Era Visionary Group (NEVG) to be the new "Barça telecommunications operator" until December 2030, when the new stadium is expected to be fully operational.

Barça defined this strategic provider as "a world leader in connectivity and infrastructure integrations", but a simple internet search is enough to verify that the activity of this company is very scarce and rather recent. In fact, it opened its headquarters in Spain at the end of February 2024, less than a year ago, according to the Official Gazette of the Commercial RegistryIt is based in a block of flats next to the Sant Andreu stadium, has a share capital of less than 3,000 euros and two sole directors: Francisco Maza and a Moldovan businessman called Ruslan Birladeanu.

In the small print of the communication of this commitment, there is a collaboration with the multinational Orange to "equip the future Camp Nou with a state-of-the-art 5G infrastructure." What is not explained is that, before the appearance of NEVG, Barça had been negotiating with Cellnex, an Ibex 35 company that provides neutral connectivity to stadiums such as the Etihad in Manchester or the Metropolitano in Madrid for that same contract. From one day to the next, Barça's head of purchasing, César Martínez, who is Laporta's most trusted confidant, stopped answering emails to Cellnex..

Barna Porters, Nike and Limak

There are at least two other contracts that have caused internal earthquakes in the offices. One small and one gigantic. The first caused the resignation of the head of security who began his term with Laporta, Ferran López: Barna Porters was awarded the contract for the stadium's accesses, cameras and microphones after a dispute with Sabico that the former head of the Mossos did not see anything clear. And the second ended with the resignations of Ramón Ramírez and Jordi Llauradó, the top officials of Espai Barça, who did not share the change of conditions that favored Limak in the award of the Camp Nou renovation works. The Turkish construction company had never built a football stadium outside its country.

Juli Guiu also folded a few weeks ago due to a modus operandi which he did not share when negotiating with another key partner of Barça: Nike. The man who until recently was vice president of marketing for the Barcelona club resigned because he did not understand why Laporta imposed an external intermediary like Darren Dein to close the deal with the textile multinational. The English agent will earn around 50 million euros until 2038 if all the variables of the contract are met. Barça will pay them.

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Barça replica at the ARA

In relation to the article published in the ARA on February 16, 2025 with the title How and with whom does Barça make deals?, the Barcelona club has requested to make some corrections.

Regarding the operation that was closed for 30 million euros with Forta Advisors Limited, and the money that did not enter Barça's accounts until January 3, the club states: "It is not correct. The operation was closed with a company with a different name and registered and with a registered office not established in the United Kingdom3. :59 hours on December 31, 2024, and this was duly accredited to the League." The ARA confirms that one of the two companies to which Barça has sold rights to 475 seats VIP

Regarding sources close to the board of directors of the club, Barça, who say that the representative Pini Zahavi has commissioned 5% of this operation, Barça denies the percentage: "Mr. Pini Zahavi has not commissioned 5% of this operation."

Regarding the fact that in the small print of Barça's communication about the commitment with New Era Visionary Group there is a collaboration with Orange, the club assures: "The announcement about the agreement with NEVG is entitled FC Barcelona signs with New Era Visionary Group, which, in collaboration with Orange, becomes official telecom operator of the club and does not contain fine print. Therefore, Orange's collaboration in this operation is not only stated in the headline of the news but appears with the same preponderance as the rest of the information in the announcement."

Regarding the resignation of the club's former head of security, Ferran López, Barça states: "Mr. López did not resign from his position, but was fired." Regarding the resignation of Ramón Ramírez, it states: "Mr. Ramón Ramírez did not resign, but was fired as part of a restructuring process of the department in which he worked [Espai Barça]".

Regarding the fact that the former vice president of marketing at Barça submitted his resignation because he did not understand why Laporta imposed an external intermediary, Barça rectifies. Guiu's reasons were personal, and this is expressly stated in the communication sent by himself to the club. In no case was the reason for it the one stated in this paragraph [of the article]". The ARA confirms that, regardless of the personal reasons that Guiu gave in his resignation letter, The former director also folded due to his disagreement with the mediation of Darren Dein on the Nike deal.