Stadia Ventures, a recently founded Sports Innovation Hub located in the heart of St. Louis, just completed their first official cohort and accelerator program designed to help sports related startups grow their business.
The 10-week accelerator program, which began in September, offered four startups the opportunity to work with Stadia and their team of highly connected executives. Starting in 2016 Stadia will offer two 10-week programs per year, accept up to five companies per cohort and invest up to $100K into each business.
The companies that Stadia is working with during their current cohort includes, Fishidy, an innovative fishing app that connects anglers across the globe to help them pinpoint the best fishing spots. LEIF Technologies, a next generation snowboard that allows snowboarders to ride anywhere, and in any weather throughout the year. Rookies, which allows fans to create, print and share their favorite moments through baseball cards. And finally, Winning Identity which strives to help golfers around the world lower their score with an all-in-one platform.
More detailed information on these four startups can be found in our Startup Profile Series.
While finishing their current cohort, Stadia is also preparing for their Spring 2016 program. With their inaugural cohort under their belt, Stadia has been able to learn what they are searching for in companies that will be applying for their program. “I think that we have a stronger idea of the type of company that is a good fit for Stadia and we’ll work hard early in the application process to proactively identify those candidates. We are a smaller, high-touch type of operation that really embraces a very personal relationship with our founders,” said Art Chou, Stadia Ventures Co-founder.
“I can’t tell you what it looks like, but I will be able to tell you when I see it,” Chou explained when speaking about what they are looking for in a company for their spring cohort. “It’s about finding the right combination of business model, traction, sector, and founder that matches our capabilities”
Although Stadia doesn’t have a specific set of qualities that they are looking for, they would like for companies to have existing sales and proven traction. “We want to spend the time with you growing specific parts of your business as opposed to designing your product or service,” said Chou. “The side benefit of this type of approach is that quite a few of the applicant companies are pretty far along in their revenue growth. These companies really don’t need $50-100K as much as they need specific connections with sales/marketing partners or potential acquisition partners. When they look at our list of advisors and industry contacts they can almost pre-select the relationships and doors that they want us to open for them.”
With the application window for their spring cohort now open, the goal for Chou and Stadia Ventures is to let current sports startups know that a network like Stadia’s exists and they’re interested in any and all innovative sports ventures. “Stadia’s strength is in the quality of our network. We have relationships with a broad range of the sports industry, from ESPN to the Golf Channel to NASCAR to Callaway. Guest speakers that traveled to visit us in St. Louis this past fall included senior leadership from Under Armour, STATS, U.S. Soccer, IBM Watson, and Dick’s Sporting Goods. Our local partners that host our events include the Cardinals, Blues and Rams. We give companies unmatched access into the sports industry,” said Chou.
For companies interested in applying to work with Stadia Ventures during their Spring 2016 cohort, the application can be found here.
