Sports Loft Podcast

Charlie is joined by Kelvin Cui - CEO of Peripheral and former Tesla robotics engineer - to explore how the learnings from self-driving cars and the concept of spatial intelligence are being used to shape the future of live sports broadcasts.

The Peripheral system produces two outputs: photorealistic volumetric video that lets fans, broadcasters and analysts fly a virtual camera around a game, viewing replays from any angle; and player pose tracking down to the finger joints used for semi-automated officiating and injury prevention.

Since presenting at this year’s Sports Loft Summit (only three months ago), Peripheral has demoed the tech with the NBA Launchpad programme at NBA Summer League, and just closed an $8.7M seed round co-led by Inovia Capital and Deloitte Ventures, with existing backers Khosla Ventures and Entrepreneur First doubling down.

In this episode, Charlie and Kelvin discuss:
· Why basketball has been such a successful proving ground, and what it takes to scale the tech up to stadium-sized pitches like football and rugby
· Why Peripheral is able to use fewer cameras than other solutions
· How volumetric replays can be integrated into team apps, and directly empower fans and creators to tell their own stories from the game
· The commercial opportunities for rightsholders when using volumetric video
· What the recent $8.7M seed round unlocks over the next 12 months, from permanent installs to expanding into new sports

In this episode, Charlie is joined by Ben Warner, co-founder of Electric Twin, to discuss how sports organisations can use synthetic audiences to get a much better understanding of their fanbase.

Enabled by advances in AI and behavioural science, synthetic audiences allow organisations to model how people think and behave, enabling them to test ideas before investing time and money. We believe this has the potential to dramatically change how sports organisations can understand their fanbase, and to do so at a scale and level of detail that would not be possible with traditional research. With funding from the likes of Atomico, Local Global and Mercuri, Electric Twin is working with organisations such as The Times and Virgin.

In this episode:

• How Electric Twin have tested their models to make sure the data is at least as accurate as traditional research
• Why Ben views sports as such a fertile territory for synthetic audiences
• How your commercial partners can test creative and activation ideas against your synthetic audience
• How you can use existing data to establish your own synthetic audiences quickly and easily
• Why framing the question wrong isn't an expensive or timely mistake - you can just ask again immediately
• How you can test contentious issues - such as ticket price rise - in private, and avoid public backlash
• What their recent $10m Series A means for their entrance into the USA and the sports industry

Charlie is joined by Scott (DJ Skee) Keeney, CEO and Co-Founder of The Realest, to talk about the untapped revenue stream sitting inside every sports organisation - Memorabilia.

Using its on-site authentication technology, The Realest has transformed sports memorabilia from a market previously plagued by fraud into a structured, high-value marketplace. Their platform handles every step of the process: from authentication to fulfilment, photography, and sales. Beyond primary sales revenue, The Realest gives teams and leagues a new way to engage fans and access to a secondary market that generates perpetual royalties on every resale. Since presenting at last year's Sports Loft Summit, The Realest has closed a $12 million Series A backed by OneTeam Partners, PGA of America, and Elysian Park, and has worked with clients including FIFA, the Philadelphia Eagles, and the Ryder Cup.

In this episode, Charlie and Skee discuss:

•⁠ ⁠How witness-based authentication and tamper-proof markings are eliminating fraud for fans and teams

•⁠ ⁠How memorabilia can generate multiple revenue streams from a single item with minimal operational lift on the club's side

•⁠ ⁠What the $12M raise means for The Realest's international expansion plans into Europe and Asia

•⁠ ⁠Why physical, authenticated items are becoming more valuable in an AI-dominated world

“Every company now has a TikTok strategy… yet more people now use mobile wallets than TikTok, so why don’t you have a wallet strategy?”

Eric Senn, CEO and co-founder of Badge, joins Charlie on the Sports Loft podcast to discuss why the mobile wallet is quickly becoming the most powerful interface for fan engagement. With mobile wallet usage now outpacing platforms like TikTok, Badge has built the infrastructure to enable sports organisations to meet fans where they already live. Eric explains how sports organisations can move beyond using wallets for simple digital ticketing and create a branded experience that is pre-installed on every fan’s device. Coming off the back of their recent $13.8m Series A funding, we hear about the rapid growth Badge has seen since we heard from Eric at last year’s Sports Loft Summit.

Some of the topics we discuss include:

• How the pre-installed mobile wallet provides a 'lighter weight' entry point for fans compared to the high-friction journey of downloading a traditional team app
• How Badge enables sports organisations to trigger notifications and relevant sponsor offers precisely when a fan reaches the stadium gate through geofencing.
• Why developing across Apple, Google, and Samsung wallets is a massive engineering task and how Badge simplifies this into a single API.
• Integrating wallet passes with stadium POS systems to track real-time ROI and fan spending habits.

“Every company now has a TikTok strategy… yet more people now use mobile wallets than TikTok, so why don’t you have a wallet strategy?”

Eric Senn, CEO and co-founder of Badge, joins Charlie on the Sports Loft podcast to discuss why the mobile wallet is quickly becoming the most powerful interface for fan engagement. With mobile wallet usage now outpacing platforms like TikTok, Badge has built the infrastructure to enable sports organisations to meet fans where they already live. Eric explains how sports organisations can move beyond using wallets for simple digital ticketing and create a branded experience that is pre-installed on every fan’s device. Coming off the back of their recent $13.8m Series A funding, we hear about the rapid growth Badge has seen since we heard from Eric at last year’s Sports Loft Summit.

Some of the topics we discuss include:

• How the pre-installed mobile wallet provides a 'lighter weight' entry point for fans compared to the high-friction journey of downloading a traditional team app
• How Badge enables sports organisations to trigger notifications and relevant sponsor offers precisely when a fan reaches the stadium gate through geofencing.
• Why developing across Apple, Google, and Samsung wallets is a massive engineering task and how Badge simplifies this into a single API.
• Integrating wallet passes with stadium POS systems to track real-time ROI and fan spending habits.

Will Pithers, Strategic Partner Manager for sports at Meta, joins Andy and Charlie on the Sports Loft podcast. Having previously work at City Football Group , Will helps teams, leagues, federations, athletes and creators optimise their content strategy across Meta’s platforms.

With user behaviour shifting from public feeds toward private messaging, and short-form video dominating content strategy, we wanted to get an insider’s view on how sports organisations such as Formula 1, Premier League clubs and Mercedes F1 are navigating Meta’s eco-system to engage fans globally.

Some of the topics we discuss include:

In the latest Sports Loft podcast, Andy and Charlie are joined by Victorien Tixier, CEO of Scoreplay. Fresh off the announcement of their $13m Series A funding round, ScorePlay have been seeing huge success onboarding new clients. So we wanted to discuss how they see the content market evolving, their future product strategy and to get some very specific examples of how sports organiastions are using ScorePlay to its full potential.

Some of the topics we discuss include:

Jonny Keogh, UK&I Sports Lead at YouTube joins Andy and Charlie on the Sports Loft podcast. Having previously worked at Sky, Jonny now helps major rightsholders and sports creators make the most of YouTube. So we wanted to dig into what’s coming from YouTube, who is being really innovative in their use of the platform and get some specific examples of how teams are using it to drive revenue.

Some of the topics we discuss include:

Finn Bradshaw, Head of Digital at the ICC, joins Andy and Charlie on the Sports Loft podcast. Having worked previously with Cricket Australia and in tennis at the Australian Open, Finn now drives the digital agenda at the ICC and has events such as the Cricket World Cup to look after. So we were keen to dig into how the ICC is looking to innovate and adopt new technologies.

In our latest episode with Finn Bradshaw:

Innovating at the Cricket World Cup

How the ICC uses different social platforms

Running proof-of-concepts at the ICC

Courtney Jeffries is CEO of virtual events platform, VRTL. She describes herself as a “recovering Sports Exec” having worked at the Raiders, Pac-12, MSG and then moving into startup life at Satisfi Labs. VRTL is used by the likes of Atlanta Falcons, ESPN, NY Rangers, Tottenham Hotspurs and Wolverhampton Wanderers.

In this episode with VRTL’s CEO:

The revenue opportunity from driving engagement with non-match attending fans

Creative uses of the platform in both the UK and US

Combining versatility with the ability to scale

Early adopters, pilots and opportunities in music