Putting Pakistan on football map

Forward Sports has been producing match balls for World Cups since 2014

Pakistan football team is nowhere to be seen in any of FIFA’s mainstream tournaments. Still, the country has a strong presence in almost all of the key FIFA events as it produces elite quality footballs for these campaigns.

Though the whole city of Sialkot, a small city of Punjab near Lahore, is known for producing quality sports goods, a particular company, named Forward Sports, is responsible for producing the best quality footballs and that too in huge numbers.

The company was founded in 1991 by Khawaja Masood Akhtar in a small space. They started with hand-stitched balls, taking help from the cottage industry. It means that people prepared the materials used for manufacturing footballs at home and then bring them to the factory to produce the final product.

They grew rapidly and in 1994, started making footballs for Adidas, one of the leading sportswear and sports goods companies in the world.

They were on a rise but knew that they needed to evolve more. Slowly and steadily, they brought innovation in their manufacturing process and adopted the latest technologies to expedite the process and improve the quality of producing footballs.

The man responsible for changing the dynamics of the company is Hasan Masood Khawaja, son of Masood Akhtar. He did his MSc in manufacturing engineering and put all his knowledge to work to take Forward Sports to a whole new level. He has been the managing director of the organisation for the last 17 years.

“When I joined the company in 2006, my father urged me to automate the processes, something different to conventional,” he said. “It took me one year to replace stitching with sticking via thermobonding technology to make the balls. It was used by the Japanese before and it increased the manufacturing process exponentially.”

The company got out of the shackles of the cottage industry in 2007. Being associated with that home-based industry, they had limited resources and there was no confidentiality also regarding designs and other aspects. Moreover, the element of child labour was also troublesome and international media created a lot of fuss about it. The management limited the human factor, introduced business shifts and developed a method that did not require stitching.

In 2014, the company produced footballs for a World Cup for the first time and since then they have not looked back.

Hasan maintained that under his supervision, the company is not only focusing on business growth, but also on beautiful ball designs and better quality balls without increasing the prices much.

Forward Sports claims that they are the only manufacturers in the world who make footballs using five different methods. One of the main reasons behind this unique feat is that they develop these techniques themselves.

Hasan believes his education has helped a great deal in taking Forward Sports onwards and upwards because he views product manufacturing as the main component, not marketing and advertising.

“Definitely, studying abroad is a major component [in our success]. I looked for studies related to sports [manufacturing] and found Loughborough University in the UK specialised in it. Our teachers didn’t guide us to make products, they taught us performance parameters, how to know them and control them,” he said. “Meanwhile, I learned in the industry that if a machine paces up the process, it can grow the business.”

Making balls for World Cup

The process of making a ball for a tournament like a World Cup is quite challenging as one needs to maintain KPIs throughout.

“There are few prerequisites to make balls for the World Cup. We have to maintain the brand’s KPIs on a consistent basis. You need to maintain quality, deliver on time, protect the environment, use recyclable materials, treat labour well, and keep up with the health and safety requirements,” Hasan revealed.

“There are a number of KPIs to meet and we have to execute them consistently on a yearly basis. There is a process of scoring where all suppliers are audited and then we are notified about who’s the top-performing supplier. By being at the top, we were given the opportunity to make balls for the biggest tournaments in 2014, 2018 and 2022.”

For the ongoing edition in Qatar, the company has made 66,000 match balls and around 4.4 million replicas.

Furthermore, he highlighted that Adidas doesn’t rely on one country or company due to several reasons, such as any unforeseen circumstances that halt production; therefore, the ball is made in two countries – Pakistan and China.

“We have been competing with Japan and China. Currently, Japan is not in contention and China is making the balls,” he stated. “They can’t risk it [giving the whole responsibility to one country] for such a big event as unforeseen circumstances can lead to stoppage of supply. So, for the last 12 years, we and China are in this competition,” he said.

Growth of Forward Sports

The company currently has 4,400 employees and also did a small expansion recently in Egypt following the demand of Adidas.

“We have started a small unit in Egypt by the name of Forward Egypt a day before the start of the World Cup,” he shared. “The response was overwhelming and their government requested us to bring a small purchase order for the inauguration. So, an economical version of the World Cup ball with the help of machine stitching is started over there.”

“It is not an official match ball because for producing it, a country must have a rich history. The takedown version of 15,000 balls was transferred in Egypt, where we made around 50-100 balls in the presence of high officials,” he added.

Adidas is expecting the African market to grow into one of the biggest football markets by 2030 in the world and that is why Hasan has expanded his company’s operations to Egypt. Moreover, the managing director of the company wants to explore the European market as well and having a unit in Africa can help it.

“On the other hand, there has been logistic congestion due to COVID-19, and the lead time is long and expensive, so there must be a market near Europe which can deliver the goods in 10 days. To capture the market demand, we made a small unit in Egypt to supply it to African and European markets.”

“We had to start one in Uzbekistan as well but due to some obstacles, we couldn’t do it. Moreover, we made a sale point in Dubai which is still progressing,” he added.

Secret of success for Sialkot

Sialkot is not just renowned for making footballs. It also has a good reputation for making other sports goods, such as hockey sticks, cricket bats, racquets and others. However, the production of footballs gets the most coverage because of the scale at which the game is played.

According to him, the secret behind companies’ success in Sialkot is the constant support of its citizens. For instance, they recently built an airport and launched an airline to cover the export gap.

“Sialkot is a small community and a well-connected one. Sialkot Chamber of Commerce and Industry should be accredited for our achievements,” he said. “Being united and working together has been a part of our culture. We felt there is a need for a quick way to transport goods, so we invested in the airport and airline.”

He claimed that they all work together as a unit and avoid going to the government for help. “Be it paving a street or building facilities, everything is done collectively with our own investment,” he added.

Hasan, a fanboy

Hasan is an avid football fan who loves Egypt’s and Liverpool’s striker, Mohamed Salah. He wishes to meet his favourite player soon.

“My favourite player is Salah and I have asked my partners [in Egypt] to plan a meeting with him but he does not stay much in his country,” he said.

Meanwhile, he further shared that Germany, who could not advance to the second round in the World Cup for the second consecutive time, is his favourite team.

“Germany is my favourite [team] as our brand is German and we travel to attend their events. I was there in Brazil when they defeated the home team 7-1.”