New technology from startup ventures is transforming the sports industry. The mission of this series will be to introduce startup companies in the sports technology space to a broader audience and allow CEO’s of promising new ventures to tell their story.
Company: ScoreStream
CEO: Derrick Oien
1. What is your elevator pitch?
ScoreStream crowdsources real time sports scores, photos, videos and chat for high school and local sports. Globally.
2. Problem & Solution
Local sports were traditionally the domain of local media and by local media I mean primarily local newspapers. With the consolidation of local media over the last 20-30 years that coverage has largely evaporated in many but not all markets. We felt that the interest and passion around local sports hadn’t disappeared, just the coverage. We created a platform that allows fans to report on games and share that information with other fans in realtime while the game is happening. We were right.
Recently we scored over 10K games in real time across the United States with the vast majority being high school games but also lower division college, D1 college and pro. In addition to that we had games scored all over Canada, some games in Zimbabwe and also Greece. Users post great videos and photos that we syndicate out to top tier media partners across the country. Currently we have scoreboards and on air tickers with roughly 300 media partners.
3. Market – your target market and the overall market
Our target market are fans of uncovered and undercover sports. We have been focused primarily on high school but our fans started scoring their college games, their pro team games and their kids local sports games. Because we have taken a tool based approach we are also getting organic adoption in various parts of the world as well.
4. Business Model – how do you make money?
We are currently a free service to both consumers and media partners. As we continue to scale we expect to focus on sponsorship and advertising as the primary revenue opportunities.
5. Management Team – with titles
Derrick Oien, CEO. John Smelzer, President. Josh Stephens, CTO. David Podolsky, CPO. Bruce Worman, CFO. Our core team has 3 former CEOs and we have had 5 exits between us.
6. What else do you want the audience to know about your venture?
ScoreStream is a crowdsourcing platform for high school and local sports. Originally that mean high schools primarily but is has turned into college, pro and club sports from top tier to the youngest kids sports teams. Fans can share scores, photos, videos and chat about games and share it via our scoreboard widgets, Facebook, Twitter and SMS.
Bonus Question:
If you were to invite any CEO to dinner who would it be and why?
Noam Bardin the former CEO of Waze. We take inspiration for what they have done globally for traffic as it is similar to what we want to do globally for sports coverage.
Grant Son executed this interview.
Grant is a proven innovator and champion in both large corporations and entrepreneurial environments. Professional experience includes serving as CEO of two digital ventures – SchoolSports (top-10 sports website acquired by ESPN) and Greater Good Ventures – as well as senior roles with iconic sports brands such as CBS, the NFL, and Sports Illustrated. MBA in finance from Columbia and BA from the University of Pennsylvania. Thirty years of experience, including 20 years in digital media. Board member and advisor to established companies and more than 20 start-up ventures.
Attended every major sporting event, including six Super Bowls, World Cup Soccer, World Series, NBA Finals, Stanley Cup Finals, championship boxing, and two Olympics.