Overview of the UK #sportstech landscape

Home of European SportsTech

The UK outnumbers the other European countries by far if it comes to SportsTech companies. The Premier League is the best football league in the world with investors pumping incredible amounts of money into it. Naturally a lot of SportsTech companies trying to get a piece of it. But besides that, there are a lot great initiatives fostering the SportsTech spirit in the UK. London Sport is trying to make London the most physically active city in the world. The Sports Technology Awards are celebrating innovation in sports. And Leaders are running premier industry events. The mixture of established players, new startups and a grown up ecosystem is a unique setup and puts the UK of the forefront of SportsTech in Europe.

I’ve screened over 1000 SportsTech companies in Europe, clustered them and put them into one big database. I started to share my insights with overviews of the Nordic, the German and the French SportsTech landscapes, now it’s time for the French one. Other countries and regions will follow.

The four sectors of SportsTech

Here’s a brief description of how I divided the SportsTech landscape.

Activity & Performance: Solutions surrounding the actual performance, no matter if it’s before, during or after the activity. Typical offerings are data tracker, wearables and new kinds of sports equipment.

Management & Organisation: Solutions that help to manage organisations, venues, leagues and events. Also covers platforms to find other sportsmen, coaches, etc. and to buy products and services, such as tickets or trips.

Media & Fans: Solutions that provide sports interested people and companies with all kinds of content and data. Also includes social platforms that help with branding and connecting fans with athletes, teams, etc.

Games & Bets: Companies that provide eSports, Fantasy Sports and Betting solutions, for players & gamers and as a service.

Note: Some companies cover two or even more sectors/subsectors. For the purpose of this overview they had to be assigned to only one.

The UK SportsTech landscape

Some very interesting SportsTech companies have their home in the UK. Here are a few exciting ones I want to highlight.

Arena: Uses big data & artificial intelligence to equip professional & media clients with real-time granular simulation.

FitnessGenes: The world’s #1 personalized diet and fitness plan based on DNA.

Minglvision: Providing multi-angle personalised broadcast based on Artificial Intelligence.

Opta: The world’s leading sports data provider.

Pitchero: Provides clubs, league or organisations with the tools to create a website, manage their membership and collect payments online.

Shot Scope: Performance tracking wristband for golfers.

Smarkets: Online investment platform that facilitates honest, user-centered trading on sports.

STATSports: World-leaders in GPS performance monitoring and analysis for professional sports teams.

Sweatcoin: The first cryptocurrency backed by physical movement.

You think I’ve missed a company? Reach me via LinkedIn, Twitter or mail.

Distribution within the country

City distribution: As expected most of the companies are located in London, home for more than half of the UK SportsTech market. Interestingly the gap to all the other cities is very big and there is no strong second city. Aberdeen, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds and Manchester can still get that spot.

Sector distribution: Contrary to all the other overviews so far, “Media & Fans” is the biggest sector in the market. From a subsector perspective “News & Content” is clearly in front, with is “Marketplaces & Discovery” and “Betting” following behind.

Approx. 19% of the SportsTech companies in the UK have been founded in the last 2.5 years, which is clearly lower than the European average of 25%.

Interested in more data & insights? Reach me via LinkedIn, Twitter or mail.

More data coming up

I’m going to publish overviews for other countries and regions throughout the next weeks and months. Make sure you follow me here on Medium and sign up to my newsletter to get the latest insights.

Benjamin Penkert is Head of Business Development & Events at the Swedish startup accelerator Fast Track Malmö and Founder of SportsTechX, an organisation that connects SportsTech startups with investors and the sports industry. You can get in touch via LinkedIn, Twitter or mail.

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