Southeast Asia ranks as the seventh largest economy in the world and has a population of more than 600 million people, presenting a considerable market for sports media businesses.

The 2015 Southeast Asian Games in Singapore attracted more than 398 million television viewers in 10 territories in Southeast Asia and 55 million views on YouTube.

The media value generated from television broadcast and YouTube for the sponsors of the Games was $117 million (£82.5 million/€105 million) and $23 million (£16 million/€21 million) respectively.

A report by Asian Sponsorship News also ranked Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand as the top countries in Asia in terms of sponsorship spend on sports as a proportion of GDP (Gross Domestic Product).

Speaking on the SPORTEL and Sport Singapore panel entitled "Opportunities for the sports media industry in Southeast Asia", Lee stated her belief that all this presents the chance for growth.

"For us the digital world is the most exciting thing happening and it's going to keep growing in the next three to five years," she said.

"And I think we should try to embrace the growth and development of the digital world instead of trying to fight it and trying to take control of it.

"If we work with the right partners and the right platforms, we don’t have to worry about all the other content that is out there.

"They’re going to be available anyway; we can’t stop that but we need to produce quality content and we need to embrace the situation.

"We work with different stakeholders, like right owners, and advertisers need to understand and ride the wave of the digital world and get on it - don’t fight it."

The session specifically looked at the opportunities as well as the challenges that Southeast Asia, as an emerging market, presents to right-holders, sports marketing agencies and media owners delivering sports content to the region.

Joining Lee on the panel was Lau Kok Keng, partner and head of intellectual property, sports and gaming practice at Singapore's largest law firm, Rajah & Tann.

He insisted that expensive content fuels the inclination to try to get it for free through unauthorised means.

"It’s no use in creating and monetising content if you can’t make money out of it," said Lau.

"So a lot of the challenges that we’ve seen in the area of sports media comes from the unauthorised access to content.

"There are a lot of complex problems associated with the digitalisation of content because there are so many ways in which people can overcome the technical restrictions imposed by right owners."

The session also examined how companies can grow their business in Southeast Asia by leveraging on social and digital media as well as what other sports, besides football, can work in the market.

Elliot Renton, a Singapore-based digital, media and sports specialist working for mobile video and advertising company Grabyo, addressed the issue.

"I think a lot of companies have made that transition into digital fairly successfully, whether it’s a newspaper publisher or a rights holder," he said.

"I think where we’re still lagging is the shift into social and exploiting video and creating delightful experiences for fans around the region.

"I think the obvious opportunity is to take digital to the next stage in Southeast Asia."

MP & Silva has been managing media rights distribution of sports properties in Southeast Asia for almost 10 years.

In 2015, it entered into a 15-year partnership with the Football Association of Malaysia as its global advisor for all media and commercial rights.

A six-year strategic deal was also struck with the Football Association of Singapore covering the global media rights, sponsorship and international events of the national and age-group teams.