A military officer and avid sportman, who has competed in Ironman triathlon, strongman, boxing, and MMA events, His Highness Shaikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Khalifa of Bahrain was appalled at the opportunities available for local MMA fighters. So he founded KHK MMA team in Bahrain, providing the fighters with housing, food, a stipend, medical and rehab care, and an international coaching staff.
Shaikh Khalid too found international fight opportunities for the fighters wanting, so he founded Brave Combat Federation in 2016. And further, he had a vision for all of mixed martial arts; Brave CF president Mohammed Shahid, Bahrain’s first pro MMA fighter, is bringing that vision to fruition globally.
The sport that we love and is the fastest-growing in the world also has one special quality: the gift of globalization,” explained Shahid to Sports Industry Series. “MMA globalized faster and more than any sport including football [soccer].
The UFC took 11 years to make a profit, and then 25 years to be worth 4 billion dollars. The MMA industry is an industry without major cash flow and it can be a struggle to make money. Most MMA promotions have no money, managers have no money, athletes have no money. It is all done for the love of MMA.
We are not in the same league as the UFC or ONE. They are in the MMA world, and their benchmark is the NFL. We are talking about creating a FIFA and a UEFA, that will create ten or twenty four-billion-dollar companies. That will create Conor McGregor’s in every country and they will all make the same amount of money. Even if they don’t speak English. We need to make MMA truly global.”
We are the Apple of the MMA industry. We are bringing a system that the whole world of MMA will be able to enjoy. Today, we are the only truly global MMA promotion. It’s time for the fastest-growing sport with the gift of globalization get what it deserves. That vision is called Brave.
We are changing MMA’s perspective by bringing government officials, the world’s top businessmen, and celebrities to the sport as we did at the London event. We did what no other MMA promotion has the power or resource and reach to do. And we are happy to pull off that kind of event. This is to show MMA has the power and sports value, as much, if not more, than other sports.
Brave is not a promotion it’s a vision. Five years from today MMA will be starting a strong foundation that puts it in the same league as other sports and the industry will have cash flow and all promotions, managers and athletes and media platforms will have an ecosystem that enables everyone to make money and grow.
We were in profit after our first year. The reason being we are able to deliver what MMA could never deliver, whether to a brand, host country or to an investor. MMA was just an event and didn’t have the power and value of what sports can provide the brand or host nation. Brave identified and delivered these sports values, and because Brave’s vision is to change MMA from an event business to a sports business.
We’ve always broken records. And this is not the first time UFC is in Abu Dhabi, and it was never able to deliver what people expect to get from a sport but no one realized until it was too late, that they are not a sport, but they are in the event business, practicing a sport. That’s where MMA is in its infancy and we are taking mixed martial arts from the event business to the sports business.
His Highness Shaikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Khalifa and his vision was solely to make it into a sport. And stop making this sport an event business. Let athletes from around the world be heroes, regardless of language, race or culture or marketability. Let them be judged on talent alone. Let the industry have class and bring the biggest players of sports to MMA and let’s make a global ecosystem from amateur to national, to regional and international.
No promotion or person or entity will ever be able to do that alone. Whoever understands the vision is always welcome and if they are the top giants of the sport it is only positive.
