Machine-learned attendance prediction for ticket distribution

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions executable by a processor, the instructions comprising:

• instructions for accessing, for a stadium associated with a sports team, a set of training data describing historical attendance data for sporting events at the stadium, describing historical opponents of the sports team during the sporting events, and describing historical win/loss records for the sports team;
• instructions for training, using the set of training data, a machine-learned model configured to predict an attendance for a future sporting event at the stadium based at least in part on a future opponent of the sports team at the future sporting event and a current or predicted win/loss record for the sports team;
• instructions for selecting, by a ticket exchange server, a future sporting event for the sports team against an opponent, wherein the selected future sporting event is scheduled to occur at a future time;
• instructions for inputting event information for the selected future sporting event to the machine-learned model, the event information comprising the opponent and a current or predicted win/loss record for the sports team;
• instructions for receiving, from the machine-learned model, a predicted attendance for the selected future sporting event;
• instructions for identifying a number of tickets greater than a capacity of the stadium to make available for the selected future sporting event based on the predicted attendance;
• instructions for distributing, via the ticket exchange server, up to the identified number of tickets to prospective attendees of the sporting event, the distributed tickets identifying a section of the stadium but not identifying a specific seat within the stadium;
• and
• instructions for, in response to receiving a location of a mobile device including a distributed ticket captured by a GPS receiver of the mobile device indicating that the mobile device is located at the section identified by the distributed ticket within the stadium, assigning, via the ticket exchange server, a seat within the section to the distributed ticket, and detecting a near-field signal transmitted by the mobile device identifying the distributed ticket to the seat within the section to physically unlock the seat.

A computer system comprising:

• a computer processor;
• and
• a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storage instructions that when executed by the computer processor perform actions comprising:
• accessing, for a stadium associated with a sports team, a set of training data describing historical attendance data for sporting events at the stadium, describing historical opponents of the sports team during the sporting events, and describing historical win/loss records for the sports team;
• training, using the set of training data, a machine-learned model configured to predict an attendance for a future sporting event at the stadium based at least in part on a future opponent of the sports team at the future sporting event and a current or predicted win/loss record for the sports team;
• selecting, by a ticket exchange server, a future sporting event for the sports team against an opponent, wherein the selected future sporting event is scheduled to occur at a future time;
• inputting event information for the selected future sporting event to the machine-learned model, the event information comprising the opponent and a current or predicted win/loss record for the sports team;
• receiving, from the machine-learned model, a predicted attendance for the selected future sporting event;
• identifying a number of tickets greater than a capacity of the stadium to make available for the selected future sporting event based on the predicted attendance;
• distributing, via the ticket exchange server, up to the identified number of tickets to prospective attendees of the sporting event, the distributed tickets identifying a section of the stadium but not identifying a specific seat within the stadium;
• and
• in response to receiving a location of a mobile device including a distributed ticket captured by a GPS receiver of the mobile device indicating that the mobile device is located at the section identified by the distributed ticket within the stadium, assigning, via the ticket exchange server, a seat within the section to the distributed ticket, and detecting a near-field signal transmitted by the mobile device identifying the distributed ticket to the seat within the section to physically unlock the seat.