These sportstech startups scored money at the 2019 Sports Innovation Conference
At last week’s second annual Sports Innovation Conference, produced by the Conshohocken-based VC firm, six startup founders from around the U.S. had the opportunity to pitch their sportstech ventures to a panel of judges, including former Philadelphia Phillies player Ryan Howard and NBA Hall of Famer Ralph Sampson.
The pitch competition capped off a day of panels at Citizen’s Bank Parkabout the future of innovation in sports, including a conversation about Nerd Street Gamers‘ esports deal with retailer Five Below.
Judges of the pitch competition included Howard, who’s also a SeventySix Capital investor; Sampson; Jennifer Fox, the president of wealth management at Bryn Mawr Trust; and Jeff Kunowski, associate director of innovation programs of the Global Sport Institute at Arizona State University.
U.S. News College admissions scheme focuses spotlight on university athletics
Eric Hyman said he was stunned to learn of the college admissions scandal. In more than 30 years of working as an athletic director of college sports, from Virginia Military Institute to Texas A&M, he’d never heard of someone outright buying a position on a team.
But that is the reality of a college admissions bribery scandal that helped children of wealthy parents enter numerous elite educational institutions, like Yale University, Stanford University and the University of Southern California. Students’ parents essentially purchased slots for them on teams that play nonrevenue college sports that appeal to families with higher incomes — like crew, soccer or lacrosse.
“One of the issues here is whether people at the top of the universities bear some responsibility,” said Kenneth Shropshire, the Adidas distinguished professor of global sport and CEO of the Global Sport Institute at Arizona State University. “If this was the English department or history department or the music department, would it stop there with the professor or would you look to the person ultimately in charge?”
And many more athletic departments could be susceptible to this kind of fraud, Shropshire said, as long as coaches have the power to provide a list of students that they want admitted to the institution without anyone second guessing their choices.
But some noted that major academic institutions cannot micromanage their massive athletic departments.
Day 5: Educating athletes and the public, DC partnerships, redesigning design
Editor's note: Friday's events at the Barrett & O'Connor Washington Center focused on helping professional athletes transition out of their playing careers, new ways of involving citizens on decisions about science and policy, and a roundtable on redesigning design education. Find the blog roundup here, with links to the other day's highlights.
Learn more: Global Sport Institute
8:35 a.m. Friday, March 16
This morning's panel was hosted by the Global Sport Institute. What's that?
To start — the singular "sport" in the name is on purpose. It involves organized athletics, yes, but also looks at fitness, education, sociology, technology and other issues. It's part of the Global Sport Alliance, a partnership between ASU and adidas aimed at shaping the future of sport and amplifying sport’s positive impact on society.
GSI supports and translates complex research to broad audiences and is led by Kenneth L. Shropshire, an international expert at the intersection of sports, business, law and society.
“The Global Sport Institute will support collaborative inquiry and research that examines critical issues impacting sport and all those connected with sport,” Shropshire said in this story. “GSI's purpose will be to transform the resulting findings into practical knowledge that is widely shared, educating and influencing audiences.
Panel: ‘For the Win: Innovative Approaches to Athlete Education’
2:30 p.m. Friday, March 16
Led by Kenneth Shropshire, CEO of the Global Sport Institute and Adidas Distinguished Professor of global sport, a panel of experts discussed how education can help athletes transition out of their playing careers and onto paths to long-term success.