<![CDATA[Stories by Benjamin Penkert on Medium]]> https://medium.com/@bpenkert?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/fit/c/150/150/1*Foex3C3ZDQ26-2LLQJALYw.jpeg Stories by Benjamin Penkert on Medium https://medium.com/@bpenkert?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 Medium Sun, 15 Nov 2026 16:51:37 GMT <![CDATA[SportsTech in June — A summary]]> https://bpenkert.medium.com/sportstech-in-june-a-summary-3fff3a45adc4?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/3fff3a45adc4 Fri, 02 Jul 2021 07:42:41 GMT 2021-07-02T07:42:41.360Z SportsTech in June — A summary

Fitness startups keep collecting money

Another month has passed in a year that will break all records when it comes to SportsTech funding. In the midst of it all is the well-known fitness theme with a range of new investment rounds. The NFT craze has cooled down a bit, as it seems that rights holders are analysing which concepts work and which not (more content on NFTs in sports on niftysports.co). Instead we’ll have a quick look on some team sports related news. Also the SportsTech ecosystem with its innovation initiatives went with less announcements as we are entering vacation season.

🏃 Fitness startups score big time

We keep stressing how much investment is pouring into SportsTech startups in 2021 after a year in which investors have rather been on the cautious side. And the one theme that keeps standing out from the pack is fitness, especially in the month of June, in which the top 6 FitnessTech deals combined for close to $600m:

💵 Gympass raises $220m in Series E round from SoftBank and others

💶 Urban Sports Club receives €80m investment

🏦 Fight Camp boxing training system secures $90m funding

💳 CureFit gets $75m investment from Tata

🤑 Fitness coach platform Lenus gets $50m from EQT Ventures

🥊 Liteboxer gets $20m for ‘Peloton for boxing’ solution​

Two areas that got multiple deals are the aggregators Gympass and Urban Sports Club, who offer memberships and digital classes to their customers, and the ‘Peloton for boxing’ companies Fight Camp and Liteboxer. Seems like we moved on from ‘Peloton for rowing’ to the next sport ;)

👀 An eye on team sports

When looking at the other interesting news from June we’ve realised that the underlaying theme is team sports, even though the type of announcements varies:

💲 Sportradar with traditional IPO instead of SPAC

💸 SIGNA Sports United going for $3.2b IPO at NYSE

🤝 Catapult Sports acquires data analytics firm SBG

💰 GumGum rebrands to Relo Metrics after $75m round from Goldman Sachs

⚽ TOCA Football raises $40m round for Topgolf-like concept

📱 Buzzer with $20m round for live streaming app​

Three of the above news cover the area of analytics, with the Sportradar IPO, the acquisition by Catapult Sports and the rebranding/investment round of GumGum. The second big IPO, ecommerce giant SIGNA Sports United, covers multiple sports, with team sports being one of them. Buzzer, the innovators in streaming highlight clips from games, secure a good invest after closing lots of content deals. And then there’s TOCA Football who’s building tech-supported entertainment centers to gamify the already beautiful game for everyone.

🚀 The ecosystem keeps it low

In the first months of the year we have seen multiple announcements of big brands and other players about their respective startups initiatives, probably more than ever before. That has cooled down a bit in June as programs are either in full work mode or coming to an end before the summer kicks in. However, there is still some news we’ve come across in this area:

🏀 Euroleague Basketball announces winning startups in FanXP challenge

⭐ Techstars Sports accelerator announces new cohort

For the second half of 2021 we expect in-person events to pick up steam again, including the usual startup pitches and competitions. We do look forward to see which companies will be put in the spotlight!

🧹 Finishing up

And that is it, another article in our monthly series that looks back on what happened in the world of SportsTech. The next one will be published in the first week of August. In the meantime make sure to check out our other content:

And have a look at Hello SportsTech, where we showcase cool, new SportsTech apps & devices and present the latest top news.

Have a great day!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about startups and innovation in sports. You can get in touch via LinkedIn, Twitter or email.

]]> <![CDATA[SportsTech in May — A summary]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/sportstech-in-may-a-summary-1f63bb38568?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/1f63bb38568 Thu, 10 Jun 2021 16:59:25 GMT 2021-06-10T20:58:41.094Z SportsTech in May — A summary

It’s groundhog month… :)

Why so? In our last look-back we spoke about an emerging pattern in SportsTech and May was nothing else than a confirmation of this: SportsTech in 2021 shows big investments activities, an influx of NFT projects and more and more initiatives by big brands. Let’s have a look!

🤑 Big tickets and acquisitions

March generated over $1b of SportsTech investment with just four deals, in April we had three deals combining around. $300m. And May was not much behind with $270m across four deals:

Besides that we have seen more interesting activities and big numbers

The latter is obviously a ground-breaking deal, creating a streaming giant that will combine WarnerMedia assets with the Discovery TV portfolio and compete with Netflix and Disney+.

Great traction in SportsTech 2021!

👾 N to the F to the T

It’s still the mega trend of the year: NFTs. And even though the markets are struggling we believe this is just a natural process in the hype cycle journey in order to find the mechanics that really provide value. And it didn’t stop many players in the sports industry to come up with new drops and initiatives:

🏀 Euroleague Basketball announces NFT platform

⚽ MLB and Candy Digital partner for NFT initiatives

⚽ ManCity drops a championship collection

🥊 Floyd Mayweather launches his legacy collection

🥊 DAZN releases boxing NFTs

🎮 Virtus.pro launches esports NFTs

Quite some news for an industry that is still early! And to make sure you can follow all of them we have set up Nifty Sports - your single source of information about NFTs in sports (also on Instagram and Twitter). Make sure to subscribe to the weekly newsletter.

🚀 SportsTech initiatives from the big guns

In last month’s article we spoke about the SportsTech initiatives from Techstars, Startupbootcamp, a new innovation hub in Barcelona and the new MoveWell accelerator. May continued to deliver news in the SportsTech initiatives segment, but this time it was coming from the core of the sports industry as various household names had announcements for us:

While having a tech/startup focused initiative was more of a “nice to have” in the last couple of years this now seems to turn into a “must have”. Most of the big associations/leagues and many leading clubs run programs/hubs/etc. in order to stay at the forefront of developments. All this was likely accelerated by the pandemic as the industry realised how important digital assets and capabilities are.

🧹 Finishing up

And that is it, another article in our monthly series that looks back on what happened in the world of SportsTech. The next one will be published in the first week of July. In the meantime make sure to check out our other content:

And have a look at Hello SportsTech, where we showcase cool, new SportsTech apps & devices and present the latest top news.

Have a great day!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about startups and innovation in sports. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

SportsTech in May — A summary was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[SportsTech in April — A summary]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/sportstech-in-april-a-summary-5f75fef8f525?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/5f75fef8f525 Thu, 06 May 2021 09:17:20 GMT 2021-05-06T09:59:16.234Z SportsTech in April — A summary

Investments - NFTs - Sleep - Repeat

It seems like this is the pattern the SportsTech world is following in 2021. And April was no exception to that, but added a nice little flavour with some hub/accelerator-related highlights. Here we go!

🤑 Investors keep their wallets open

In last month’s article we wrote about the incredible $1b+ of investment that went into SportsTech companies in March. While that naturally cooled down a little bit we still saw three big deals that combined for over $400m of investment in April:

  • Chinese fitness startup FITURE has secured $300m investment round. The Mirror competitor raised its third round in six months, the investment was co-led by Legend Capital and also featured Bertelsmann Asia Investments, Tencent and Nio Capital
  • Jeff Bezos, Drake and others invest $80m in sports media company Overtime. The company distributes original sports content on social media outlets and recently announced a paid basketball league for young players
  • Gamified connected rowing machine Ergatta raises $30m. The round was led by Advance Venture Partners with participation from Greycroft, Fifth Wall, Gaingels and Hans Tung (GGV). The funding will go toward developing new content, competition and (of course) social features for its platform. Seems like the “Peloton for X” movement doesn’t lose traction

Besides the above mentioned it was Peloton who announced that they are raising a $875m post-IPO round. That might also be needed in the realm of the current issues the company is facing.

While the world slowly gets out of the pandemic it seems like Fitness and Content keep being the dominant themes in SportsTech.

👾 NFTs don’t stop

Talking about dominant themes… It is still one of THE topics in sports (and probably the entire world) this year: Non-fungible tokens. Reason enough for us to set up Nifty Sports, your single source of information about NFTs in sports. Here are the two highlight launches of the month:

  • The Golden State Warriors launched an NFT collection, claiming to be the the first professional sports team to do so. They call it the “legacy collection”, already hinting that it’s a journey into the franchise’s past. It consists of virtual championship rings and ticket stubs, that in the ring case also have a physical equivalent. The unique items also come with a “Warrior for a Day” experience which includes a mock “one-day contract”, courtside tickets for two, a “Honorary Captain” experience, etc. And boy was that a success! The 329 items were sold for 677 ETH, which as of today (May 5) is about two million euros. Well played!
  • The MLB launched their first baseball card NFT collection in cooperation with Topps (who announced to go public in a $1.16b SPAC deal), the long-term partner of the league in physical collectibles (aka trading cards), and WAX as a tech partner on who’s blockchain the NFTs are created, sold and traded. The result: All available packs (standard and premium) were sold out within the first two hours of the launch (April 20) for about $2.65m in revenues. The revenue on the secondary market was around 8 million USD in the rest of the month. On the flipside the project had some tech issues around the initial pack drop, not being able to handle the massive amount of requests they had. Nevertheless a good debut for the MLB!

All other news, drops, trades and insights about NFTs in Sports on Nifty Sports! And make sure to follow us on Instagram and Twitter as well.

🚀 Hubs & Accelerators are getting active

It feels like it’s been relatively quiet for some time when it comes to hub and accelerator news. But that has changed now, potentially due to the fact that many programs still have a seasonal approach, and spring being a popular time to announce new activities. Here’s the news from last month:

  • The Minnesota Twins launch an accelerator with Techstars. The plan: Support 30 startups in three annual cohorts. Details on what they are looking for have not been revealed yet, but the Twins are “striving to innovate on and off the field”. Applications open May 10 and the kickoff for the 13-week program is November. We like that a pro team is partnering up with a respected and successful startup player in the market who brings in the relevant expertise and an excellent network.
  • Startupbootcamp’s Sport & EventTech Accelerator Australia announces their new cohort which will be held virtually from May onwards. The 10 selected startups come from all over the world. Here are the winners: Atlas Coaching (feedback & analysis), CityGuyd (augment real life guides & figures), Famecast (help influencers), Full Venue (likelihood of a fan to make a purchase), Homefans (Airbnb for sports experiences), Promoshare (closed marketplace), refbook (connect, manage, appoint & track sports official), Row Nation (Indoor Rowing community), SportMatch (digital talent ID platform) and Sportvot (platform for sport bodies to stream their games).
  • Launch of the Barcelona Sports Tech Hub to make the city an international leader in SportsTech. The idea is to bring together companies, large corporations, institutions, start-ups and other tech stakeholders with an emphasis on three aspects: 1) High performance sport, 2) Water sports and the promotion of the blue economy, 3) Sports activity for the public. This also includes an incubator located at the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys and a project for the Port Olímpic. As this is a publicly funded project they also announced that the initial investment is 3 million euros. We are happy to see this initiatives as our European SportsTech Report showed that there are a lot of Spanish startups in sports, but so far they’ve been struggling to succeed and to raise investment.
  • Last but not least there’s the newly started MoveWell European accelerator for sports, movement and physiotherapy. It is an initiative created by eHealth Valley and a large network of partners, including healthcare incumbents (PartenaMut, Partena Ziekenfonds and Goed), retail institutions (Decathlon) and top-tier universities and physiotherapy centers. Move Well aims to select and help 5–10 startups by providing innovators and founders with the specific help they need to grow their project. The application phase just closed, lets see which startups they’ll select.

Techstars, Startupbootcamp and two new initiatives in Europe: This was an interesting month and brings new opportunities for SportsTech startups on a global level.

🧹 Finishing up

And that is it, the fourth article in our monthly series that looks back on what happened in the world of SportsTech. The next article of this series will be published in the first week of June. In the meantime make sure to check out our other content:

And have a look at Hello SportsTech, where we showcase cool, new SportsTech apps & devices and present the latest top news.

Have a great day!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about startups and innovation in sports. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

SportsTech in April — A summary was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[SportsTech in March — A summary]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/sportstech-in-march-a-summary-a82010b86231?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/a82010b86231 Thu, 08 Apr 2021 07:54:14 GMT 2021-04-08T07:54:14.514Z SportsTech in March — A summary

Record spendings into SportsTech

Before we start: Here’s a song to bring you into the right mood for the upcoming content (unrelated to the author of this article).

Alright. Now that the scene is set lets jump right into it.

🤑 It’s deal o’clock

When publishing our Global SportsTech VC Report in Q4 last year we reported a $1b+ investment month for SportsTech in September. Our explanation: Investors have been holding back their funds over the year, only to jump at the most promising prospects when the first signs occurred that the world is moving out of the pandemic. Other strong months followed, with the main investment themes being Fitness (primarily in the US) and Fantasy Sports (primarily in India). Let’s keep that in mind for a bit.

Fast forward six months later. It’s early April 2021. And this is what just happened...

One by one:

Three out of those four match exactly the spike that we’ve seen in September, as we have US-based Fitness (Tonal, Tempo) and India-based Fantasy Sports (Dream11). In fact Tonal and Dream11 were already amongst the contributors in September, now securing their second large round within six months. It almost seems like history is repeating itself, but instead of a month it now only took them 10 days. Bull market anyone?

But who’s the new kid on the block(chain)? One out of the four does not fit to the established pattern that we have seen. It’s Dapper Labs, creators of NBA Top Shot (and Crypto Kitties back then), the NFT / digital collectibles platform that just surpassed $500m in sales. That number alone plus other prospects coming in (UFC already confirmed, alleged talks with the NFL, NHL and MLB) sparks investor’s interest. Who is involved in the current round besides the GOAT himself?

Athletes: Kevin Durant, Andre Iguodala, Kyle Lowry, Spencer Dinwiddie, Andre Drummond, Alex Caruso, Michael Carter-Williams, Josh Hart, Udonis Haslem, JaVale McGee, Khris Middleton, Domantas Sabonis, Klay Thompson, Nikola Vucevic, Thad Young, Tim Beckham, Nolan Arenado, Ken Crawley, Thomas Davis, Stefon Diggs, Dee Ford, Malcom Jenkins, Rodney McLeod, Jordan Matthew, Devin McCourty, Jason McCourty, DK Metcalf, Tyrod Taylor and Trent Williams.
Others: Vivek Ranadive (Kings), Bolt Ventures, Richard Seymour’s 93 Ventures, Ashton Kutcher and Guy Oseary’s Sound Ventures, Will Smith and Keisuke Honda’s Dreamers VC, Shawn Mendes and Andrew Gertler’s AG Ventures, Shay Mitchell, and 2 Chainz, a16z, The Chernin Group, USV, Version One, and Venrock.

What an all-star lineup! Random thought: Who would ever have expected that the Crypto Kitties makers and Michael Jordan team up…

Speaking of NFTs

We at SportsTechX are big believers in the potential the technology has for sports. In order to educate ourselves and others we set up a new initiative called NIFTY SPORTS, aiming to be the your single source of information for everything that is related to NFTs in the world of sports. Expect news, drops, trades and insights into the market. Need an example? We did a quick comparison of Q1 for NBA Top Shot and Sorare.

Want more of this? Subscribe to our newsletter and make sure to follow us on Instagram and Twitter to ensure that you hear about breaking news, drop announcement and other relevant happenings right when they pop up. Oh, and our content is available as a podcast as well (on all major platforms). See you on the nifty side!

💥 More highlights of the month

The acquisition market is heating up as well!

🚴 Peloton acquires Atlas Wearables, Otari Mat, Peerfit, and Aiqudo, adding a smart yoga mat, an AI coach plus a fitness tracking device to their portfolio. At the same time they are partnering with Adidas for a collection and stating that the apparel department is the biggest growth driver within the company. What does all that mean? Peloton is developing from a “one product company” into a full fledged connected lifestyle and tech company that utilises its strong premium brand. All while the FAANG’s are pushing heavily into the fitness market (see our North American SportsTech Report). One of the most exciting spaces to watch!

🎥 Sportradar acquires Synergy Sports, the leading U.S. college sports data and video analytics provider to its portfolio. That news came shortly after announcing to go public via a $10b SPAC deal lead by Todd Boehly. Makes it even easier to spend some money :) The goal behind the acquisition? To strengthen the company’s U.S. sports offering, both in college and professional sports, and to add Synergy’s automated sports technology solutions. All in order to provide a seamless experience for media companies, leagues and betting operators alike.

👑 DraftKings acquires VSiN, the multi-platform sports betting broadcast and content company to boost sports betting content. That does not come as a surprise, as we recently have witnessed multiple cases where sports betting and sports content go hand in hand, and DraftKings previously announcing an integration with Dish. More examples? ESPN has launched a YouTube channel dedicated to betting while Yahoo has been working with the NBA on betting-centric broadcasts, including commentators and screen graphics. And content isn’t just limited to the live broadcast either, FanDuel recently announced a social media partnership with WAVE.tv who will launch betting themed TikTok and Instagram channels to reach younger audiences.

And we haven’t even covered Eleven’s acquisition of Team Whistle or content platform theScore raising $186.3m through a U.S. IPO. And what’s gonna happen when all those money-loaded SPACs start to deploy their money?! This space is bananas ;)

🧹 Finishing up

And that is it, the third article in our new monthly series that looks back on what happened in the world of SportsTech. The next article of this series will be published in the first week of May. In the meantime make sure to check out our other content:

And have a look at Hello SportsTech, where we showcase cool, new SportsTech apps & devices and present the latest top news.

Have a great day!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about startups and innovation in sports. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

SportsTech in March — A summary was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[SportsTech in February - A summary]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/sportstech-in-february-a-summary-2cec8e03e823?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/2cec8e03e823 Thu, 04 Mar 2021 11:15:03 GMT 2021-03-04T11:53:40.905Z

The digital collectibles have arrived!

Before we come to that here’s a little intro: This is the second edition of our new, monthly wrap-up of the things happening in Sports and Technology. Speaking of new: We started to discuss the top SportsTech findings in a weekly show that is aired on YouTube and Twitch. We’re going live on Thursdays at 6pm Berlin time (CET) / 12pm New York time (EST) aka noon. The show is also available on-demand in case you wanna watch it later.

Coming back to what happened in SportsTech in the last month. We’ll cover one main topic that stood out for us and will throw in a few additional topics. Here we go!

👾 Digital collectibles have arrived

NFT — WTF? The non-fungible tokens are here. All theory aside (Google will help you out here) this is what happened over the last weeks:

🏀 NBA Top Shot grossed more than $200m in sales

First things first: What are they selling? On the platform you can buy (limited) highlight clips from NBA games, let’s say a deep 3-pointer by Steph Curry. The question arises: Why would you do that as you can just watch the highlight on YouTube? Well, that is what is heavily discussed these days. One of the main points is that you can say that you own that moment. Well, mostly not exclusively, some or many others also own that moment, depending on how many of these items have been issued by the NBA in this case. Owning moments seems to be something special for a fan and creates a certain (emotional) value.

To make things a bit more complicated: All of these transactions and the storage of those moments are happening on the blockchain, which allows to authenticate each token (in this case highlight clip) and provides the history of previous transactions. This leads to another interesting aspect: Not only can you buy those clips (also available in packs where you don’t know what’s in them) but you can also sell them on a marketplace on the platform. And there is money to be made! Recently a dunk by LeBron James was sold for over $200k, making the previous owner really happy. Expect to see some serious NFT-traders in the future.

Coming back to the headline: NBA Top Shot brought in over $200m in revenue for the NBA, who is operating the platform together with Dapper (mostly known for the CryptoKittens hype in 2017). We have officially entered a hype cycle! The big question is: Is this gonna last or is it a bubble that is gonna burst sometime soon? One thing is clear: With those numbers on the table big leagues and players are definitely going to watch the space and put their toes/tokens in it!

⚽ Sorare raises €40m for its digital collectibles platform

A few days after Top Shot reported its unbelievable numbers, Sorare announced a big funding round that involved investors like Benchmark, Accel, Gary Vaynerchuk, Antoine Griezmann, Rio Ferdinand and Oliver Bierhoff. So what is Sorare? Well, also there you get your tokens. This time it’s not basketball but football (aka soccer). It’s not highlight clips but player cards (think of Panini). And it’s not a league running it but Sorare is entering agreements with the clubs directly, which currently includes the likes of PSG, Real Madrid, FC Liverpool, Bayern Munich and more. Another difference is that Sorare also offers a 5-a-side fantasy sports game in which you can win cards and rewards.

Same as with Top Shot the tokens (in this case player cards) can be traded on its marketplace. An interesting angle to it is the bidding system for cards that are getting issued to the market, which adds some extra flavour. Sorare didn’t report any revenue numbers yet, but we have seen cards change owners for high 5-figure amounts. Let’s see to which new heights the platform will bring it and which teams are going to join in the upcoming weeks.

To sum it all up: Both NBA Top Shot and Sorare are highly interesting use cases for tokens in sports. We’ll be watching this space and are curious who else is gonna enter!

💥 More highlights of the month

🤸 Big tech fitness war in the making!

It’s not news that big tech is entering the sports/fitness market. But the moves are happening more frequently than ever before. Soon after the news broke that Apple is working on a VR headset that will ultimately lead to AR glasses for the mass market there was a very good article by Outside Online on Apple seeing its future (and purpose) in fitness, health and wellness. This fits well to the recently launched fitness+ offering and the announcement of the Time to Walk audio walking experience. Potentially as a reaction to Apple’s move we saw news coming out about Facebook building its first smartwatch that — what a surprise — also includes fitness features. That all in the context of Google’s FitBit acquisition and Amazon having launched its Halo devices. There’s rumble in the (fitness) jungle!

🧓 The discovery of the 50+ target group

Yes, we’re talking about fitness again but it doesn’t have to stop there. Reason to bring this up is the $7m round raised by Bold, a fitness program offering for “older adults”. That itself is already interesting, but the key here is that the lead investor is Andreessen Horowitz. Quoting Julie Yoo, general partner at AH: “Bold’s fresh approach to virtual fitness programs for older adults is perfectly timed with the transformation happening across the industry around ageing in place in the context of one’s broader clinical and social needs.” A space to watch!

📡 Comcast announces first SportsTech cohort

For its accelerator program 10 startups were selected from over 1,000 applicants in 70 countries and will work with Comcast NBCUniversal and an impressive partner consortium, which includes NBC Sports, Sky Sports, Golf, NASCAR, U.S. Ski and Snowboard, USA Cycling, USA Swimming, and Comcast Ventures. On top they receive $50k and 12 weeks of training. Target areas are media and entertainment, fan/player engagement, athlete/player performance, team and coach success, venue and event innovation, fantasy sports and betting, esports, and the business of sports. In our opinion the program is one of the most promising ones out there, as we see a really good potential to push the startups with Comcast’s offering and the one from its partners.

🏈 Rethinking Football — and sports leagues?

The Fan Controlled Football League has launched! As the name already suggests this new model puts the fans first, mainly the ones watching at home or on the go, as the experience is optimised for streaming (of course they’re using Twitch). But the real deal is the possibility to interact and influence the game, as decisions are democratised amongst the followers of the teams. That includes aspects like drafting players, deciding on the lineup and calling plays during the game, all of them voted on with the FCL app. And as a special highlight fans can buy a part of the team and become and owner, for example the popular Beasts. All together a very interesting model that changes the dynamics of how a sport is owned and operated. Viewership was 700k+ during the opening weekend, it’s to be seen how much that continues to hold up!

🤑 Gaming and fantasy sports keeps attracting money

Only five months after it secured a $90m funding the Bangalore-based esports and gaming platform Mobile Premier League (MPL) has raised another $95m. Say what? The Series D round was led by Composite Capital and Moore Strategic Ventures, boosting the valuation to $945m. Not a unicorn quite yet :) With the fresh money MPL looks to grow in international markets. Why? Even though the user numbers are impressive, they are mainly distributed between India (60m) and Indonesia (3.5m). Currently the platform offers 70 games across multiple sports and also offers fantasy sports. So off to new markets it is, especially as India does not permit fantasy sports apps on Play Store in a market where 99% of the phones have Android running on them. An understandable move!

🧹 Finishing up

And that is it, the second article in our new monthly series that looks back on what happened in the world of SportsTech. The next article of this series will be published in the first week of April. In the meantime make sure to check out our other content:

And have a look at Hello SportsTech, our latest initiative in which we showcase cool, new SportsTech products.

Have a great day!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about startups and innovation in sports. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

SportsTech in February - A summary was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[SportsTech in January 2021 — A summary]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/sportstech-in-january-2021-a-summary-ddd3144f88a?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/ddd3144f88a Thu, 04 Feb 2021 17:04:34 GMT 2021-02-04T17:04:34.369Z SportsTech in January 2021 — A summary

Content is king but even better with context!

That’s why we at SportsTechX decided to kick off a new series of articles that put the relevant SportsTech news out there into perspective. The series will consist of monthly look-backs on what happened in the ecosystem.

So let’s start with what went on in January 2021 in the world of Sports & Technology. Enjoy!

Topic 1: 🏃‍♀️ Fitness

Some out there might say “This is so 2020” but history seems to repeat itself: The FitnessTech train just doesn’t stop and kicks off 2021 with some big headlines like it did last year. And things seem to heat up.

Keep and Cure.fit, both in a fight to win over fitness enthusiasts for their platforms in Asia and beyond, have taken measures to take things into the future. While Keep raised a big chunk of money to expand services and its product line, Cure.fit takes a tech-driven approach with the acquisition of an AI body tracker that it will integrate into its offering. Here are the details.

Keep secures $360m funding

China-based fitness app Keep provides at-home workout videos via its mobile app. The company has over 300 million users and the business model is based on subscriptions. Lately they have expanded their product line with stationary bikes that come with video instructions (sounds familiar somehow…), apparel, treadmills and smart wristbands.

Facts about the funding round

  • The Series-F was led by SoftBank Vision Fund. Other investors are Hillhouse Capital, Coatue Management, GGV Capital, Tencent, 5Y Capital, Jeneration Capital and Bertelsmann Asia Investments
  • Valuation at about $2 billion post-money
  • Currently no IPO plans
  • Purpose of the funding: Improve services and products for users and serve fitness professionals

Source: Techcrunch

Cure.fit acquires AI body tracker Onyx

India-based fitness platform Cure.fit is mostly known for its exercise videos and online group classes but offers a broad collection of health-related services that include fitness and yoga, healthy meals, mental wellbeing and primary care. The company raised $110m in 2020 and over $400m in total. Now they have acquired Onyx, a 3D motion capture app that tracks a range of exercises via the smartphone camera and the help of computer vision and AI.

Facts about the deal

  • Financial terms were not disclosed
  • Onyx enables Cure.fit to track motion at scale without a wearable, removing a disadvantage compared to competitors such as Apple (who has its watch and the Fitness+ service)
  • Adds personalised guidance and the ability to coach larger numbers of people without physically interaction, moving away from one-on-one sessions or depersonalised mass content
  • Opens the option to include more nuanced exercises, such as dance and yoga, as well as fast-paced activities like high-intensity interval training
  • It’s unclear when the app will be added to Cure.fit’s offering and if/how the current pricing ($15 monthly or $100 annually) will change

Source: VentureBeat

Our comment: Both ways have their charm, it’s hard to predict which one is the better. We are convinced that optical solutions are a must-have in fitness-offerings of the future. But maybe it’s not the tool to acquire customers and build a leading market position yet? We’ll watch this space from the sideline and see how it’s gonna unfold.

Onto the next trend topic.

Recovery is set to become a big business (more details in our FitnessTech Report). Quote: “Recovery methodology for a mass market is being redefined as fitness enthusiasts increasingly see preparing for and recovering from exercise as essential as the workout itself. But physical regeneration is only one variable. A host of stressors, including nutrition, sleep, and mental health, can hinder success. Recognizing this fact, startups are seizing on this moment, laying the groundwork for a multi-billion-dollar category”. Back then we already mentioned Hyperice, who recently secured an NFL deal, and now tries to manifest its leading position with an interesting acquisition.

Hyperice acquires RecoverX

U.S.-based Hyperice, the industry leader in recovery technology and pioneer of percussion, vibration, dynamic air compression and thermal technology, acquired RecoverX, a tech company specialising in intelligent thermal technologies.

Facts about the deal

  • Financial terms were not disclosed
  • Hyperice adds the cofounders, a team of engineers and product developers
  • Hyperice also adds a diverse IP portfolio that advances its thermal technology capabilities and connected ecosystem
  • Helps Hyperice to unveil a new category of recovery technologies that optimize human performance, longevity and health in Summer 2021

Source: Yahoo! Finance

Our comment: This looks like a very smart move. Hyperice already is in a very good position and now they acquire smart talent and valuable IP to further strengthen their offering. Could be from the acquisition blueprint book (we’re sure it exists somewhere). Together with the NFL deal (will other leagues/deals follow?) and the involvement of one of the prime athletes in the world, Pat Mahomes, this is a super strong setup. IPO bets anyone?

Other fitness-related news worth mentioning

Topic 2: 📹 Content & Analytics

January saw two bigger deals in the field of content production/distribution and analytics. On the one hand there’s Veo who started their journey in football (aka soccer) and is expanding from Europe into the U.S., from amateur clubs to professional teams and now wants to add other team sports to their offering. On the other hand there’s ShotTracker who is coming more from the analytics side of things, is purely focused on U.S. college and now wants to dig even deeper into this. Here’s the recent news about them.

Veo raises $24.5m round

Copenhagen-based Veo Technologies offers a video camera ($800) and cloud-based subscription service ($1,200 annually) to record and automatically select highlights of football games and training, which it then hosts on a platform. Veo currently works with 5,000+ clubs globally, mainly amateur clubs, but lately also professional teams in the Premier League, La Liga, Serie A, Ligue 1 and the MLS, and has recorded 200,000 games since 2018.

Facts about the deal

  • The Series B round was led by Danish investor Chr. Augustinus Fabrikker, other investors were Courtside Ventures, Ventech and SEED Capital
  • Valuation is not disclosed, but sources say it’s well over $100 million
  • Use of the funds: Expanding U.S. operations with an office in Miami, building the computer vision algorithms to expand into other team-based sports (including rugby, basketball and hockey) and improving analytics around the clips
  • The long term plan is not to build a media empire, but to be an enabler for content creation, going the Shopify way, not the Amazon one

Source: Techcrunch

ShotTracker raises $11m round

ShotTracker provides real-time basketball stats and insight for teams and broadcasters. The system uses sensors in balls, players’ jerseys and court sensors to track movement, allowing players to identify their most productive areas and to create a 3D court for enhanced analytics. It’s used by 60+ NCAA men’s and women’s college basketball schools (installation costs about $45,000), with partners like Nike, Adidas, and Under Armour.

Facts about the funding round

  • Terms of the financing were not made public
  • The round was led by Verizon Ventures and broadcast equipment manufacturer Evertz Technologies
  • ShotTracker has now raised more than $30 million in total
  • Plans to expand the workforce, deepen key partnerships and enhance sensor capabilities & data capture for players, coaches, fans and broadcasters
  • Verizon will improve ShotTracker’s cloud infrastructure with the help of 5G

Source: CNBC

Our comment: Both B2B offerings want to continue their success stories in a very crowded market. Veo’s success seems to be based on a really good pricing of their camera and systems, combined with a high quality offering, while ShotTracker is highly specialised on basketball stats and involves sensors that gives them access to different kinds of data. An overlap might only occur on ShotTracker’s home turf of U.S. college basketball. The main selling point for Veo in that area (if they can deliver similar insights) is likely their pricing. But given the fact that they’re not in basketball yet and the strong connections that ShotTracker has built, it doesn’t look like a low-hanging fruit. But there’s probably enough fishing grounds for both of them anyways. To be continued!

Other content-related news worth mentioning

Topic 3: 💥 Special Mentions

Fitness and content have been the two outstanding themes in the month of January for us. But there are other headlines that caught our attention, so we’ve included them in this “Special Mentions” section to make sure you’re in the loop. Here we go!

  • The Loupe app secures €3m and aims to unite sports card breakers (google it, it’s a thing!) and collectors on a single platform. The collectibles space is hot these days
  • The final of the 6th annual 1st & Future startup competition of the NFL showcased football helmet maker Genesis Helmets, wearable hydration sensor Nix, PEEP Performance, the maker of a breathing device that’s also a protective mouthguard, and motion sensor developer Organic Robotics, which uses light to measure muscle fatigue and ultimately won the event
  • Some interesting investment-related news appeared over the last weeks: Causeway Media’s health and fitness SPAC (SPACs are a big topic lately) prices upsized $240 million IPO; US private equity firm Silver Lake is in talks to acquire a stake in the famous New Zealand’s All Blacks rugby team and NBA franchises can sell 30% of their shares to private equity investors

🧹 Finishing up

And that is it, the very first article in our new monthly series that looks back on what happened in the world of SportsTech. The next article of this series will be published in the first week of March. In the meantime make sure to check out our other content:

And have a look at Hello SportsTech, our latest initiative in which we showcase cool, new SportsTech products.

Have a great day!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about startups and innovation in sports. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

SportsTech in January 2021 — A summary was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[The 40+ Books Leaders in SportsTech were Reading in 2020]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/the-40-books-leaders-in-sportstech-were-reading-in-2020-fcec503520f?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/fcec503520f Wed, 13 Jan 2021 13:22:48 GMT 2021-01-13T15:14:20.992Z

2020 was one for the books.

It was a year that forced us all to hunker down and turn our homes into both an office and a retreat. What wasn’t affected though is that we at SportsTechX had the opportunity to speak with great entrepreneurs and business leaders on our SportsTech Allstars Podcast. Like every year we’ve asked all our guests for their book recommendations, to get some inspiration for our readers and of course ourselves as well :)

Our 23 guests in 2020 shared 48 books with us, more than twice as many titles as in the 2019 article. Within the list there were some familiar names but, of course, there were unique mentions from categories outside of sports and business too and we’re excited to share them all.

Sports-Related

  • Bill Walsh: The Score Takes Care Of Itself (Link)
  • James Andrew Miller, Tom Shales: Those Guys Have All The Fun: Inside The World Of ESPN (Link)
  • Josh Appelbaum: The Everything Guide To Sports Betting (Link)
  • Micheal Lewis: Moneyball (Link)
  • Phil Jackson: Eleven Rings (Link)

Startup-Related

  • Aaron Ross, Jason Lemkin: From Impossible To Inevitable (Link)
  • Ben Horowitz: The Hard Things About Hard Things (Link)
  • Dan Thoma: The Corporate Startup (Link)
  • Peter Thiel: Zero To One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future (Link)
  • Salim Ismail: Exponential Organizations: Why new organizations are ten times better, faster, and cheaper than yours (and what to do about it) (Link)
  • Walter Isaacson: The Innovators (Link)

Business-Related

  • Clayton Christensen: The Innovator’s Dilemma (Link)
  • Deepak Malhotra: Negotiating The Impossible (Link)
  • Don Norman: Things That Make Us Smart: Defending Human Attributes In The Age Of The Machine (Link)
  • Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg, Alan Eagle: Trillion Dollar Coach: The Leadership Playbook of Silicon Valley’s Bill Campbell (Link)
  • Geoffrey A. Moore: Crossing The Chasm (Link)
  • Jocko WIllow, Leif Babin: The Dichotomy Of Leadership (Link)
  • Karen Berman, Joe Knight: Financial Intelligence: A Manager’s Guide to Knowing What the Numbers Really Mean (Link)
  • Keith Ferrazzi: Never Eat Alone (Link)
  • Ken Kocienda: Creative Selection: Inside Apple’s Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs (Link)
  • Kenneth Blanchard: The One Minute Manager (Link)
  • Ozan Varol: Think Like a Rocket Scientist: Simple Strategies You Can Use to Make Giant Leaps in Work and Life (Link)
  • Pedro Domingos: The Master Algorithm (Link)
  • Satya Nadella: Hit Refresh: The Quest to Rediscover Microsoft’s Soul and Imagine a Better Future for Everyone (Link)
  • Simon Sinek: Start With Why (Link)
  • Steven D. Levitt, Stephen J. Dubner: Freakonomics (Link)

Non-fiction

  • Andrew Yang: The War On Normal People: The Truth About America’s Disappearing Jobs and Why Universal Basic Income Is Our Future (Link)
  • Barack Obama: Dreams From My Father (Link)
  • Brian Christian, Tom Griffiths: Algorithms To Live By (Link)
  • Daniel Kahnemann: Thinking Fast And Slow (Link)
  • Daron Acemoglu, James A. Robinson: Why Nations Fail (Link)
  • Jeremy Rifkin: Hydrogen Economy (Link)
  • Jon Gordon: The Energy Bus (Link)
  • Laura Spinney: Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 And How It Changed The World (Link)
  • Melinda Gates: The Moment Of Lift (Link)
  • Paramahansa Yoganand: The Law of Success (Link)
  • Phil Knight: Shoe Dog (Link)
  • Ray Dalio: Principles (Link)
  • Yuval Noah Harari: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (Link), Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow (Link), 21 Lessons for the 21st Century (Link)
  • William Dalrymple: The Anarchy — The East India Company, Corporate Violence, and the Pillage of an Empire (Link)

Others

  • Adam Johnson: The Orphan Master’s Son (Link)
  • Dale Carnegie: How To Win Friends And Influence People (Link)
  • JD Salinger: Catcher In The Rye (Link)
  • Jonathan Frazen: Freedom (Link)
  • Kurt Vonnegut: Cat’s Cradle (Link)
  • Paulo Coelho: The Alchemist (Link)

How 2020 stacked up

This year’s list was certainly the longest and possibly the most unique as well. Once again, the business-related category seemed to lead the way in recommendations, and in the midst of a pandemic and all the challenges that have come along with it, these books might have offered some useful strategy, tips and inspiration. A few familiar titles resurfaced in this year’s list: Peter Thiel’s ‘Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future’, Nike founder, Phil Knight’s memoir, ‘Shoe Dog,’ and Keith Ferrazzi’s business success guide, ‘Never Eat Alone’ (which might have been hard advice to follow in 2020).

What seemed to have changed, however, is the amount of non-fiction and “other” titles which was a mix of fiction novels, memoirs, historical works and self-help guides. It’s almost as if SportsTech leaders (and probably most people around the world) were both taking the opportunity to learn about new topics and taking a break from the here-and-now to travel to imaginary worlds this year (can you blame ‘em?). Yuval Noah Harari’s trilogy of books that break down the history of humans, our current reality and a look at what the future might hold was also included in this group — may be an attempt at understanding the chaotic happenings 2020 presented to mankind?

While 2021 will (hopefully) allow us to do a bit more traveling and spending time with friends and family than the year prior, there should always be enough time to pick up a good book. Hopefully, there’s a title or two within this year’s cluster of books that catch your eye and can inspire learning and discovery in the year 2021. For another sports-focused read, check out our collection of SportsTech leaders’ favorite sports moments from the same group of guests that joined us on our podcast in 2020.

Be sure to listen to new episodes of The SportsTech Allstars Podcast this year for more inspiring stories from leaders in the global SportsTech ecosystem and keep a close eye on us at SportsTechX — we’ve got more cool stuff coming your way soon!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about SportsTech startups and the surrounding ecosystem. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

The 40+ Books Leaders in SportsTech were Reading in 2020 was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[SportsTech Leaders’ Favorite Sports Moments]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/sportstech-leaders-favorite-sports-moments-a996a2db498b?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/a996a2db498b Thu, 17 Dec 2020 13:39:41 GMT 2020-12-17T16:38:37.319Z

In a year like 2020, it’s important to reflect on the good. Luckily for us, we work in sports and there is certainly a lot of good in this industry. So much so, there are moments we can’t forget and ones we choose to relive again and again.

We’ve had a great time chatting with industry leaders in the SportsTech space on our podcast this year and we recorded our 100th episode while doing so. This season, we shifted from asking our guests to share their go-to productivity hacks to instead having them describe a memory that may be the very reason they are in the industry in the first place — their favorite sports moments.

It never gets old discussing the moments that gave us chills or had us screaming from the top of our lungs. And with an international group of guests who also range in age and background, including professional athletes or experts who have worked in the industry for decades, we were sure to get a great mix of moments. Now it’s time to look at them all and share them with you as a parting gift for 2020.

Football

Source: SCROLL

It didn’t come as much of a surprise that the most common sport mentioned was the world’s favorite: football (soccer to some). 14 of the 22 guests we spoke with in 2020 mentioned a moment (or several) from the world of football as being ones they treasure. Within the football memories, there were a few mentioned more than once. And with such a large bunch, getting a variety of favorites was inevitable, so it only makes sense to list them in chronological order of moments from the beautiful game.

To kick things off, Global Sports Innovation Center (GSIC) President, Sebastián Lancestremère took us back to the 1986 World Cup and the ‘Goal of the Century’. The moment came when football legend Diego Maradona (RIP) scored his second goal against England (not the one with his hand). The true magic in that match came when the Argentinian traveled 68 meters, dancing past a handful of English players to strike the ball past the goalkeeper and score one of the best goals in World Cup history — amazing.

We then jump to 1994, when Sweden finished third in the World Cup, which was hosted by the U.S. that year. Patrik Olsson, Co-founder and CEO at Spiideo, mentioned how big the moment was for the country and the dramatics of the penalty kick to close the match.

Veo Co-founder and CEO, Henrik Teisbæk’s moment brought us to 1999 and the Champions League FInals where Manchester United secured a last-minute and dramatic 2–1 win over Bayern Munich. Kinexon Co-founder and Managing Director, Maximillian Schmidt also mentioned the 1999 Champions League FInals match, though for him, being born and raised in Munich, the loss was brutal and one of the first times he remembers crying as a kid. So when the 2001 Champions League FInals victory over Valencia came, it was a hard-fought and redemptive win for Munich that was certainly worth celebrating.

Another ’99 favorite came from Fielding Jamieson, Strategy Director at the Global Sports Venture Studio. Her moment came from the FIFA Women’s World Cup and the USA’s 5–4 penalty shoot-out victory against China. Fielding said what made that moment special was watching the game with her family when she was just 10 years old and seeing those around her along with the general community watch and celebrate women’s sports, which inspires her still. Oh, and of course, the iconic celebration from Brandi Chastain after scoring the game-winning penalty strike.

One moment that was mentioned by two of our Italian guests that came on the podcast: World Football Summit (WFS) Director, Jan Alessie and Deltatre Head of Innovation, Pietro Marini, came in 2006. Yes — of course, it’s Italy’s World Cup win over France. A team win that overcame the madness that was a Zidane headbutt, Italy’s bad luck in the World Cup had finally ended. Pietro also mentioned Inter Milan’s 0–2 Champion’s League win over Bayern Munich in 2010 and being in Madrid to witness the victory first-hand, and in a year like 2020, Pietro probably isn’t alone in thinking back to an experience like that.

Reely CFO, Frank Bryan shared how his last minute decision to attend the CONCACAF Gold Cup Finals match between the USA and Mexico in 2011 turned out to be one of his favorite memories. In the Rose Bowl, which was packed with 95,000 fans (hard to imagine these days) where he guessed about 80,000 of them were Mexico fans, Frank was in enemy territory but still managed to have a blast. Watching the U.S. go up 2–0 in the first half he was riding a high before Mexico would go on to score four unanswered goals in the second half to win the match and set-off an electricity throughout the stadium of majority Mexico fans. A memory he will certainly never forget.

The Coaches’ Voice Co-Founder, David Sciama’s favorite football moment was Sergio Agüero’s late goal in the 93rd minute which gave Manchester City a 3–2 win over QPR and secured the 2012 Premier League title for Man City for the first time in 44 years — all in one of the most dramatic showings ever. Some may try, but this one just can’t be forgotten.

2014 brings another World Cup memory from Andreas Kitzing, CEO and Founder at Sponsoo. This time it’s the semi-finals game between Germany and Brazil, which took place in Brazil of course. Germany’s 7–1 beatdown is one of the largest World Cup victories of all time which was surely a hard pill to swallow for the hosts, but knowing that Germany went on to win the final should be a nice buffer, right? When Andreas needs a little extra motivation, he reviews the best moments from the match and it never gets old.

Another repeated favorite was the 2013–14 Champions League final match between Real Madrid and Atlético Madrid in the first final in history that both teams were from the same city. Both Jan Alessie and Julien Piwowar from Real Madrid Next mentioned the match as a favorite and it’s not hard to imagine why. Sergio Ramos’ 93rd-minute header would force the match to extra time where Real Madrid would score three unanswered goals to take the 4–1 victory and the title.

Getting closer to the present, Gudjon Gudjonsson, CEO at OZ Sports, reflected on the 2016 European Championship and the shock felt across the world after Iceland beat England, 2–1. The small country proved itself on the international stage and earned much buzz around the rise of football in Iceland.

Being French, Creative Bot (now Drop) Co-Founder and CEO, Benjamin Benichou’s favorite moment came recently when France won the 2018 World Cup in a 4–2 win over Croatia. Benjamin said the experience was particularly unique because he was living in Los Angeles at the time, so he watched the team’s journey along the local French community at different locations throughout the city.

American Football

Source: ROB CARR/GETTY IMAGES

The other sport mentioned most was also football, but this time it was of the American variety. Four of our guests spoke about a gridiron moment they cherish and within the sport, the moments and games were a mix of college, professional and personal experiences.

First, and probably most unique, was former NFL player and Beyond the Game Network Founder, Andre Fluellen’s personal experience from the last game he ever played in the league. Andre’s final year was interesting indeed, starting 2015 not being on any team but hoping to play with the Detroit Lions as they were set to play three regular-season games at Wembley Stadium in London that season. The hope was one that Andre wrote down specifically, “I want to play with the Lions and I want to play in London”. After a short stint with the Buffalo Bills (who were also headed to London that season), Andre and his wife tuned-in to the Lions vs. the Seattle Seahawks game and saw a Lions player go down with an injury. In that moment, his wife predicted the future and told him to start packing because she knew they’d call. Sure enough, a call from the Lions head coach came moments later where he invited him to join the squad and to make sure to bring his passport because they were headed to London the following week to play the Kansas City Chiefs. The game would be his final pro experience, but it was one he had written down in hopes of getting and he got to see it to fruition — ending his career exactly how he wanted to. This is one memory that is definitely worth taking another listen to so you can hear the emotion behind his recount of this experience.

Kinexon’s Maximilian Schmidt’s second of two moments he shared was Super Bowl XLIX and the back-and-forth, exciting game in which the Seattle Seahawks were expected to win. In a shocking twist of events, Seattle would ultimately fall to Tom Brady’s New England Patriots, 28–24 and it was all due to an interception in the end zone by Patriot cornerback Malcolm Butler with just 20 seconds left on the clock. A moment that no one saw coming and left all jaws on the floor and one Maximillian says he recalls often.

Next, the 2011 Tostitos BCS National Championship Game was Matthew Gunnin’s most memorable. The Esports One CEO is an Auburn Tiger himself, so Auburn’s National TItle match-up with Oregan with a field goal winning end was one he will never forget, especially because he got to experience it with his dad in the stadium. A close second was another Auburn win, this time though it was the Kick Six play in the 2013 game against long time rival and defending National Champion, Alabama in which the teams were both ranked in the top-5. Gunnin got to share both experiences with his dad, the man that taught him all about football, and these days Gunnin teaches his dad about Esports. We love a family connection and a shared love of sports.

Last for the American Football mentions was from Techstars Sports Accelerator Managing Director, Jordan Fliegel. The Boston-native listed the Patriots’ Super Bowl LI victory in 2017 as one of his favorites where Bill Belichick led his team to come back from a 28–3 deficit earlier in the game and ultimately beat the Atlanta Falcons 34–28 in what was the largest comeback in Super Bowl history. Just another notch in the winning tally for Tom Brady and the Pats.

Variety Pack

Source: USA TODAY

While most of our guests had a favorite moment they shared that belonged to the sport of football (both kinds), there were still several other sports mentioned that created a distinct memory or moment in time for a lot of the SportsTech leaders we had on the show. From basketball to rugby and even a great advertisement, this mix of moments covers all the bases (pun intended).

Australian Rules Football

Sam Robertson, Professor of Sports Analytics at Victoria University and Techstars SportsTech Melbourne Accelerator partner, spoke about his experience working during the Australian Football League 2016 Grand Final in a stadium packed with 100,000 fans and getting to see a handful of young players then go on to be successful.

Baseball

For Wayne Kimmel, Managing Partner at SeventySix Capital, the 2009 World Series game between the Philadelphia Phillies vs. the New York Yankees takes the cake for him. Having been able to attend other big sporting events with his brother and his dad, this one was particularly special because it was an experience he shared with his son who had just turned six-years-old. Likely to be an experience that they both will remember fondly.

Basketball

Jordan Fliegel’s Boston roots wouldn’t let him avoid mentioning the Boston Celtics’ 24-point comeback and NBA Finals Championship victory in 2008 over the Los Angeles Lakers. Along with his New England sports memories, Jordan has gotten to work with Steph Curry from the Golden State Warriors (over on the other coast). So seeing Curry crowned as the unanimous MVP in 2016 was another great moment for him.

On the other hand, the Cleveland Cavaliers’ 2016 NBA Championship win was Reely’s Cullen Gallagher’s favorite moment. The dramatic comeback from a 3–1 deficit against the Golden State Warriors to take game seven and win their first championship title in franchise history was LeBron James’ gift to the city of Cleveland, one he had promised to give. Cullen told us he thinks about the game daily and re-watches the game at least once a month. As a Cleveland native, can you blame him?

Russia on the World Stage

Petr Zhukov from Indigo Capital Partners had a tough time narrowing his favorite sports memory to just one moment. For him, Russia’s performance and hosting in several sports was what he remembers well and with pride. Starting in 2008, which was a landmark sports year for Russia as the global economy was suffering greatly, Russia defeated long time rival Canada in Ice Hockey during the IIHF World Championships, 5–4. Shortly after, Russia defeated The Netherlands in football during the Euro quarter-finals producing what Petr says might be the single most successful month for Russia national teams in his lifetime. Fast forward to a decade later, Russia hosted the 2018 FIFA World Cup which was an opportunity to showcase sports, friendship and kindness in which Petr said the event was incredibly organized and very well done, making it one he’ll always remember.

Sailing

Henrik Teisbæk’s other favorite sports moment comes from his competitive sailing background in which he won multiple medals and races. Standing on top of the podium, especially after coming back from a deficit are moments he’s unlikely to forget.

UFC

Matthew Gunnin also mentioned the wild 13-second ride that was the Connor McGregor vs. Jose Aldo UFC fight as being another favorite of his. McGregor quickly ended an 18-fight winning streak for Aldo that had lasted over a decade. It can all really flash right before your eyes, can’t it?

Water Polo

Milos Ribic, Director of Corporate Ventures at adidas, grew up playing water polo in Serbia and played in college in the U.S. So naturally, his favorite moment came from the sport. Watching the Serbian water polo team win gold at the 2016 Rio Olympics was his favorite sports memory. Being friends with several players on the team and seeing the win come after they had suffered several losses was understandably a great moment for him.

Advertisements

Last, but certainly not least, is a unique mention on the show. Lennardt Hachmeister from Sport Technology Systems had the most recent favorite which happened to be an advertisement from Nike that came out in June of this year. With an inspirational message of “You Can’t Stop Us,” during the times of Corona, it definitely hits a nerve.

It’s all about the experience

Going through the moments that this group of leaders in SportsTech listed, there are a few things that are clear: The first being that lived experiences just can’t be replaced. There’s nothing quite like watching your favorite team win a championship right before your own eyes and the location of the moment was often mentioned with the same importance as the moment itself. Along with location, the people you are with while watching or experiencing these exciting and historical moments is also something that will clearly stick with you for a long time. Even if it’s huddling around a TV with family, or streaming a game on your mobile app while at the office, there is more to a sports moment that sticks with you than just the action on the court or field.

The sports world has faced unique challenges this year and it will be interesting to see the new favorite moments that come from 2020 considering the circumstances in which many sports were played. One thing’s for certain, no matter where they’re viewed, sports have an important role to play and next year is sure to have many more fantastic moments in store.

Happy holidays and see you in 2021!

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about SportsTech startups and the surrounding ecosystem. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

SportsTech Leaders’ Favorite Sports Moments was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[A trip to Stadia Ventures’ pitch & demo day]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/a-trip-to-stadia-ventures-pitch-demo-day-cffa5a26f116?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/cffa5a26f116 Thu, 19 Mar 2020 13:41:38 GMT 2020-03-19T13:41:38.970Z

SportsTech excellence in the cold Midwestern January

Our 2020 SportsTech travel calendar started off strong. Only a few weeks into the new decade, we traveled across the pond to Saint Louis, Missouri for Stadia Ventures’ Spring 2020 Finalist Pitch Day on January 22nd and 23rd. After receiving many applications, Stadia invited a select group of founders to pitch their businesses to the Investment Committee and over 140 Senior Leaders in Sports & esports with the chance to take part in Stadia’s Accelerator cohort.

Stadia Ventures is a sports innovation hub that connects, educates and mentors entrepreneurs, industry partners and investors. Part of Stadia’s mission includes their Accelerator that specifically helps established sports business startups get to the next level through a combination of equity investment, intensive mentoring, and connections to the top sports business executives. Last fall, we were among the judges for Stadia’s selection days for its Fall cohort in Frisco, Texas and as an important hub for the global SportsTech landscape, we were happy to travel the U.S. once again to participate in another event hosted by Stadia.

The day’s focus was of course on the 10 finalists, out of whom Stadia would select its spring cohort 2020. But we also got to see some familiar faces throughout the event and took part in engaging networking sessions. To kick everything off, Tim Hayden, Co-Founder & Managing Director of Stadia Ventures, opened the event with introductions before the first set of pitches began. After the pitches, attendees also had the unique chance to demo the products or solutions presented by the finalists.

The Pitch Day Finalists

This year’s group of finalists represented a regional mix of companies from all over the world, who wanted to take the next step in order to get into Stadia’s program and become Cohort X, the 10th edition.

Here are the 10 finalists we heard from:

DataPOWA — London, UK

A sponsorship and digital marketing agency providing brands and rights holders with detailed measurement of actual and potential value of sponsorships alongside digital maximization solutions for marketing programs.

Edge — London, UK

The back office for the esports industry that automates payments, contracts, data feeds and player profiles for gamers, teams, leagues and brands.

Lasso Gear — Los Angeles, California

Injury prevention meets sportswear that resulted in the development of the first product, a compression sock that mimics kinesio tape, which is currently used in every major sports league and in youth sports.

MoodMe — California, Belgium & Luxemburg

A face augmented reality experience and insights platform powered by Face Neural Networks (AR filters, and emotion, gender, age detection & identification) that helps brands create memorable and measurable personalize customer experiences

recruits, and conveniently stores them separate from personal correspondence.

Rezztek — Bratislava, Slovakia

Setting a new market standard for professional and amateur hockey players through patented material for the hockey stick’s blade, which allows for better puck control, faster and more accurate shots and is fully customizable to players’ needs.

SenSwim — Tel Aviv, Israel

Proprietary, user-friendly and sophisticated machine vision technologies that enable swim teams and individuals to measure and record a variety of important parameters in real-time and offline, monitor performance, analyze data, and provide feedback to improve swimmers and coaches’ ability.

Snapscreen — Vienna, Austria

Enables TV clip creation and distribution in social media by allowing viewers to snap the TV and instantly get a HD clip to rewind, trim, and share.

Trufan — Toronto, Canada

A social intelligence platform disrupting the influencer marketing space by helping brands activate grassroots communities made up of super fans and micro-influencers.

Uplift — Palo Alto, California

Provides an AI-based kinematic analysis platform that helps analyze and improve human movement in real-time. Their software uses proprietary deep learning models and algorithms specifically designed to understand human motion.

Whistle Recruiting — Salt Lake City, UT

Trusted by 40+ Div I football programs, a recruiting communication platform for coaches and recruiting offices that intercept messages and phone calls from.

The Spring Cohort 2020

And the five teams that ultimately made it into the new cohort are:

Edge

Lasso Gear

Trufan

Uplift

Whistle Recruiting

Congratulations to all companies who are gonna work together with Stadia! Due to the current COVID-19 crisis the decision was made to run this program in a virtual setting.

Global Sports Demo Day

In the second afternoon we heard from three “accelerated” startups that were included in Stadia’s 2019 Fall cohort. As part of Stadia’s Graduation process, two Demo Days (Hometown Demo Day and a Global Demo Day), take place. Each founder pitches investors, potential customers and the media. The goal of this day is to secure additional funding, new partners, customer sales, or an exit.

The three startups that pitched were:

Clicktivated — Detroit, Michigan
Pioneer in clickable video and directly connects viewers to individual products and information inside video simply by clicking on them as they watch. Clicktivated works with iconic brands like Target, Tommy Hilfiger, Yahoo, Kohl’s, Pure Michigan and many others.

Funder — London, UK

Technology platform that powers lotteries, raffles and sweepstakes to incentivize tribal communities and fan bases to give to good causes and be rewarded with epic cash and experience prizes.

LiveStyled — London, UK

B2B SaaS platform that helps venues and business owners better understand and respond to their visitors, and spans across mobile commerce, ticketing, location services, customer identity, mass participation, while powering mobile apps, websites and digital signage.

Another fantastic trip

It was great to network with fabulous individuals and to see first-hand all the efforts being made to help startups succeed. Big thanks to our friends at Stadia for the invitation once again, we were happy to be involved. Learn more about the SportsTech scene in the U.S. in our North American SportsTech Report. And checkout a few of the finalists from Europe that were included in our European SportsTech Report as well.

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about SportsTech startups and the surrounding ecosystem. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

A trip to Stadia Ventures’ pitch & demo day was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

]]> <![CDATA[SportsTech Pitching Session in Vienna’s Allianz Arena.]]> https://medium.com/sportstechx/sportstech-pitching-session-in-viennas-allianz-arena-79116f885718?source=rss-f26c25a0ec1a------2 https://medium.com/p/79116f885718 Mon, 02 Mar 2020 17:45:29 GMT 2020-03-02T17:45:29.898Z

Austria shows its SportsTech ambitions.

Vienna played host to a special edition of the SportsTech Austria meetup, presented by SK Rapid in partnership with tipp3, primeCROWD, Tensox and Toni.ai. The event was held in the Allianz Stadium, bringing together industry leaders to share insights and perspectives regarding SportsTech in Austria and Europe alongside a set of eight innovative startups who had the opportunity to present their solutions to an expert jury and group of investors.

The evening began with a warm welcome and introduction from SK Rapid’s CEO, Christoph Peschek, who emphasised the importance of being open-minded, also for a club with a rich tradition.

We didn’t have to wait long for the pitch session which came next in order to allow the startups to showcase their work before the networking portion of the evening began.

Startup pitch session

The jury selected to evaluate the participating startups included myself along with a fantastic cohort of industry experts and investors including Bernhard Ungerbock, Investment Manager at aws Gründerfonds, Karl Heinz Götze, Executive Partner at Gamma Capital Partners, Markus Kainz, founder and CEO at primeCROWD and Markus Raunig, Managing Director at Austrian Startups.

Here are the startups that participated in the pitch session.

Keego produces a sports bottle made of squeezable metal, keeping your water pure, your equipment light and your eyes on the prize.

Keyper provides white labeled technology for easy and secure sharing and selling of tickets by connecting the existing ticketing solutions with mobile platforms.

Lympik allows users to analyze their sport performance live from their mobile phone. From timing, location tracking and motion capture, Lympik is usable for many types of sport.

PlayerHunter is an online career platform for the football industry. With a “Smart Matching algorithm,” the platform connects players and clubs efficiently, quickly and easily.

SensuSport developed and patented a technology for mental learning in sports and professional applications with SensuGlasses, a wearable training device for athletes to practice their feel and touch.

SKILLCADEMY360 creates tailored apps for football complete with a 360 degree video player for smartphones.

Trackbar is an IoT device from SKAIN that monitors and analyzes every repetition and sends data directly to the coaches and existing software system or app of the gym. The trackbar connects coaches directly with their members to push individual coaching and the workout experience to new levels.

TwoReach is a digital and data based platform that brings together sports right holders and sponsors.

Congrats to SensuSport, the winners of the pitch session! It was a great group of startups that participated, we look forward to hearing more about each company! After hearing from the startups, we were able to stretch our legs a bit while we were treated to a stadium tour of the new Allianz Stadium, home of SK Rapid.

Keynote sessions

The evening continued with high-quality keynote sessions. The first was focused on performance data in match analysis and led by Stefan Oesen, Chief Analyst at SK Rapid. It was an interesting topic that paired well with the second keynote where we heard from Martin Hausleitner, Secretary General at the European Handball Federation, and Maximilian Schmidt, Co-Founder and Managing Director an KINEXON. The pair aimed to answer how performance data can be used for both sport analysis and media preparation using the example of EHF Euro 2020.

We then heard from a panel that continued the focus on performance data including Stefan Oesen and Martin Hausleitner along with Philipp Ertl, Head of Sports Austria at Stats Perform and Dr. Anton Sabo, Director of Life Science Engineering at FH Technikum.

Another country sticking its head out

All in all, the event was a great way to showcase SportsTech in Austria, a country we’re keeping an eye on within the European landscape. Thanks to Christoph, Chris and Klemens for having me in Vienna! Learn more about SportsTech in Austria as well as the region in our European SportsTech Report 2020.

Benjamin Penkert is the Founder of Berlin based SportsTechX — Data & insights about SportsTech startups and the surrounding ecosystem. You can get in touch via Linkedin, Twitter or email.

SportsTech Pitching Session in Vienna’s Allianz Arena. was originally published in SportsTechX on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

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