Dear friends of sport,

These last weeks have been quite eventful, especially in the world of start-ups: we saw the first UEFA Start-Up Challenge kick off, an exclusive 12-week accelerator programme designed for early- and extension-stage start-ups with ambitions to impact football positively, and implemented in partnership with ThinkSport. Seven young companies were selected after an intense pitch day in mid-February. They will be mentored by senior business leaders from UEFA and experts from ThinkSport’s network, get the opportunity to test and demonstrate products/services in live environments as well as gain access to potential investors through their participation at THE SPOT. Speaking of, we have also just published comprehensive information about what is in for all start-ups at THE SPOT, including details about the start-up battle and many more opportunities. Read more here.

Through this newsletter, we would also like to help spread the word about the 2019 version of the European SportsTech Report, which was published last week by SportsTechX, a company that provides data and insights about SportsTech start-ups and their surrounding ecosystem. The comprehensive and very informative report claims that there are more than 1.500 active SportsTech companies in Europe and the invested capital reached a new all-time high with about €364 M in 2018, four times more than in 2014. Leading European countries with regard to the amount of start-up companies are the UK, France, Germany and Spain. 

In addition, we would like to share some fresh news from UEFA with you. They have just launched their UEFA Academy, bringing together all of the organisation's educational initiatives with the aim of helping the persons involved in football further develop their skills. A number of programmes of the UEFA Academy are open to professionals working in other areas of sport as well as to the general public – so why not have a closer look?

Happy reading!

Yours,

Anna Hellman, Director of ThinkSport