The 4th Quarter: Latest In Sports Tech This Week, June 14th

Women Building Future of Sports Tech, Strong Sports B2B Funding, New Job Board

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I. Business Behind Women in Sports-Tech

II. Weekly Startup Spotlight: Wild.AI & Just Women’s Sports

III. Sports-Tech Market Activity: IPOs, VC, M&A, Deals, Strategic Ventures, New Funds, Lawsuits

IV. Weekly Job Board: Sports, Media, Entertainment, Technology

The Business Behind Women in Sports-Tech: 

An unfortunate fact that has been widely accepted is that there is a clear disparity in venture capital funding between startups founded by women vs. those of men. Multiple studies have cited that women-led startups generate 35% higher returns on investment (ROI) than men-led companies. In 2021, US-based women founded startups raised a cumulative $6.4B of venture financing, which was 83% higher than 2020 but still only accounted for 2% of total VC money raised. This is a problem that is slowly becoming better, but it requires certain niches to be startup hotspots for women-founded success. 

When focusing on the Sports Industry, we’re seeing drastically higher numbers of women-led companies and women-tech solutions. The global sports market is expected to generate $826B by 2030, and ⅓ of the value being driven from women. In 2023, the Sports-Tech Sector had a record-breaking year with $37B in M&A/Financing Rounds and $7B in new money raised for investment funds. It was a huge year for women’s sports, which made up 14% of deal volume!

As more equality is coming to venture capital investments, it’s really fascinating to see the Sports-Tech vertical leading the charge. With successful, high-profile, female founders like Payal Kadakia (founder of ClassPass) and April Koh (founder of Spring Health) breaking the glass ceiling, they are changing the game forever. I have my popcorn ready, it’s damn exciting to watch.

For those interested in the business of Women’s Sports + Sport-Tech, check out Women In Sports Tech, a non-profit driving transformative growth opportunities for women in the industry!

Weekly Startup Spotlight

In support of Female Sports-Tech Startups getting the recognition they deserve, here are two that you HAVE to hear about :

• Wild.AI - After finding that only 6-8% of sports research is done on female-only groups, Hélène Guillaume saw a huge gap in the market. After spending time as an athlete & data scientist, she partnered with Dr. Stacy Sims - the consensus leader in the female physiology & nutrition science field. Together, the women aggregated 451 white papers and turned the findings into algorithms and created a super app for female data. Wild AI is able to harness data from fitness wearables and daily input to give a female readiness score for personalized adaptive training, nutrition recommendations, & unique hormonal cycle insights.The app has reached 50,000 active users and is continuing to grow!

  • Founders: Hélène Guillaume Pabis

  • Funding: Raised $2.9M from Entrepreneurs First, Google For Startups, The Refiners in addition to a solid set of angel investors

• Just Women’s Sports - In 2020, when former Stanford Soccer Star Haley Rosen decided to build this company, she saw an upward trend in the econometrics of women’s sports (260M tuned into the 2019 Women’s World Cup Final Match, WNBA Jersey Sales increased 35%, etc.) but only 4% of sports coverage was dedicated to women’s sports. After years of waiting (and waiting) for the mainstream outlets to catch onto this trend, Haley thought it was the perfect time in the market to establish a media platform for all things women’s sports. Building a media content engine, JWS is churning out short form content via social media, podcasts, newsletters, and exclusive online interviews. So far, the company has garnered 3M in audience, 80M monthly reach, 214% YoY audience growth, and 3M monthly video views. I think it’s safe to say they’re accomplishing their mission!

  • Founders: Haley Rosen

  • Funding: Previously raised $9.5M with a $6M Seed Round in 2022 led by Blue Pool Capital (Alibaba co-founder’s family office) and participation from Will Ventures, Kevin Durant’s Thirty Five Ventures, OVO Fund, Drive by DraftKings, Bolt Ventures - in addition to a blue-chip set of athlete angel investors and advisors

Sports-Tech Market Activity: Investors & Deals

Venture Capital

• Whoosh, a hospitality software solution that streamlines operations & enhances member experience for golf clubs raised $10.3M in Series A funding (June 10th)

  • Expanding into public/daily-fee clubs, alternative golf facilities, venues, resorts, and other facilities

  • Investment was led by AlleyCorp; other investors include Craft Ventures, Eberg Capital, Raptor Group, and others [FinSMEs]

• Spiideo, a cloud-powered sports tech startup automating sports video solutions for sports organizations, media holders, and teams raised $20M in Growth funding (June 5th)

  • Expanding presence within major sports and monetization of new content categories

  • Investment was led by Cipio Partners; other investors include Mathias Kamprad, Måns Hultman, and Håkan Roos [FinSMEs] 

• USTA Ventures invests in tennis tracking & line-calling startup PlayReplay at an undisclosed amount (June 6th) 

  • First startup investment from the USTA’s venture arm to elevate the playing experience and facility quality across the US [USTA]

• Particle, an AI-powered news reader that personalizes multi-perspective news for readers raised $10.9M in Series A funding (June 11th)

  • Hiring for critical roles including back-end engineer, site reliability engineer, community and editorial lead and media partnerships lead 

  • Investment was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners; other investors include Axel Springer, Adverb Ventures, and others [TechCrunch]

• Astrocade AI, a social gaming platform that allows users to create interactive games within minutes via text-to-image prompts raised $12M in Seed funding (June 11th)

  • Further developing Gen AI social gaming platform capabilities for automating creative processes

  • Investors include AME Cloud Ventures, NVIDIA Ventures, Venture Reality Fund [FinSMEs]

• Stanly, a social media startup that provides users to engage with communities dedicated to their favorite fandoms raised $8M in Pre-Series A funding (June 12th)

  • Enhancing divisions such as engineering, operations, creator support, marketing, and sales

  • Investment was led by C Capital; other investors include AppWorks, Goodwater, Palm Drive Capital, and others [FinSMEs] 

M&A and Investments

• English-Welsh Cricket Board (ECB) taps Raine Group, Deloitte as advisors in sale of team stakes from The Hundred cricket competition (June 1st)

  • Seeking to sell eight teams; offering 51% of shares to host countries for free and 49% to private investors

  • The Raine Group, previously involved in high-profile transactions including Manchester United, Chelsea, and WWE [SportCal]

• Big 12 reportedly seeking PE investment of up to $1B from CVC Capital Partners (June 13th)

  • Expected deal of $800M-$1B in exchange for a 15-20% stake in the conference [BleacherReport]

• Michael Bloomberg reportedly agrees to join Minnesota Timberwolves ownership group to obtain majority stake (June 6th)

  • Responsible for $300M+ payment in joining  A-Rod and Marc Lore in gaining controlling stake over current majority holder Glen Taylor [CBS Sports]

• English Wartford Football Club announces an offering of a 10% stake in the club to fans at a valuation of £17.5M (June 4th)

  • Reported 239% in commercial revenue growth over five seasons: Highest of european football clubs

  • Shares offered through investment platform Republic to accredited investors [WartfordFC]

• New Era to acquire competitor licensed apparel company ‘47 amid plan to IPO (June 7th)

  • PE firm ACON Investments will retain significant ownership after 2021 acquisition of stake in New Era

  • Planned to IPO at a value of approximately $5B prior to acquisition [Front Office Sports]

Photo: English-Welsh Cricket Board Taps The Raine Group & Deloitte To Sell Stake In Teams

Strategic Ventures

• Greenfly, a cloud-based platform that specializes in short-form digital media processes for brands, partners with Yahoo Sports to deliver breaking sports news to fans (June 4th)

  • Tapping into Greenfly’s platform to support reporters, producers, and staff deliver short-form sports content to fans faster via social and digital channels [Greenfly]

• Arctos, sports-focused PE firm partners with UMichigan Ross School of Business to launch NA Sports Franchise Index (June 4th)

  • ‘Ross-Arctos Sports Franchise Index’ to comprise of individual and non-control transactions from the ‘Big Four’ leagues

  • Value of NA sports franchises included increased at an annualized rate of 13.0% over 60 years; an additional 2.5% compared to overall equity market [Michigan Ross]

• Bayer Leverkusen renews partnership with sports intelligence SaaS company Kitman Labs following six year deal (June 7th)

  • Continuing to utilize the performance enhancement data-analytics solution for pro men’s team all the way down to the Under-8 Academy [Insider Sport]

New Funds 

• Chicago Bears QB Caleb Williams launches alternative investment firm 888 Midas to jumpstart early-career business ventures (June 12th)

  • Williams is reportedly expected to agree to $40M, four year deal with the Bears [Sportico] 

• Gamefam, a metaverse gaming developer and publisher launches $5M Gamefam Creator Fund to fund UGC game development (June 1st)

  • Selected creators to receive between $10K-$100K in award funding alongside support towards game design, global partnerships, access to GameFam Assets, and additional solutions [VcWire Tech]

Fundraising 

• Marc Larsy’s Avenue Sports Opportunities Fund raised over $445M to focus in sports endeavors including teams, media and entertainment rights, and real estate (June 13th)

  • Additionally focusing on providing capital solutions to sports teams, owners, and leagues alongside investing in sports related endeavors

  • Fund of PE firm Avenue Capital with $12.3B in assets, currently [Sportico] 

IPO

• Ticket seller SeetGeek reportedly seeking banks Citigroup and Wells Fargo for potential late-2024 IPO (June 5th)

  • Targeting a valuation over the $1.35B amount back in 2021 via SPAC [Benzinga]

Accelerators

• Top Canadian sports incubator Future of Sport Lab selects nine startups for its upcoming, fourth cohort (June 4th)

  • Focused on AI-powered wearables, sports betting, sponsorship management, smart tech/apparel, and other solutions [Yahoo Finance]

Lawsuits

• Oura, a health tech company that tracks health metrics via smart rings is being sued by Samsung over potential IP disputes (June 4th)

  • Preemptive lawsuit was filed from the tech giant to protect its release of the Galaxy Ring from IP violation claims [Athletech News]

• David Beckham’s DB Ventures Limited resolves $10M lawsuit with boutique fitness brand F45 Training (June 6th)

  • Beckham alleged a breach of contract over failure to transfer stock shares, loss of stock value due to price descent, and failure to issue additional $5M in shares

  • DB Ventures will carry on as an investor in the fitness brand [Athletech News]

Job Board & Opportunities: Week June 14th

1. Orlando City SC - Strategy & Analytics Assistant (Part-Time)

2. bet365 - Marketing Coordinator: $75K

3. Arizona Cardinals - Special Assistant to the COO

4. The Raine Group - Associate, Private Capital Markets: 3 Years of Experience / $225K

5. Pro Shop - Paid Media Analyst: ~3 Years of Experience / $90K

6. Detroit Lions - Strategy Manager: ~5 years of Experience

7. PGA TOUR - AI Product Manager: ~6 Years of Experience

8. LASEC - Sr. Manager, Partnership Activation & Biz Dev: ~5 Years of Exp / $115K

9. Paciolan - Sr. Product Manager: ~6 Years of Experience / $165K

10. On Location - SVP, Marketing: ~10 Years of Experience / $325K