Unofficial Partner Podcast

UP450: WTF is Infinite Athlete?


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Today's guest is Infinite Athlete founder Charlie Ebersol. 

Infinite Athlete has been a sports business story since the brand suddenly appeared on Chelsea’s shirt at the start of last season.

It's a story with a lot of baggage: Charlie Ebersol is the son of actress Susan St James and Dick Ebersol, the legendary NBC Sport chairman. IA is backed by Andreesen Horowitz, Silver Lake, Endeavour and Todd Boehly, the Chelsea co-owner. Insert the boring but important phrase ‘Associated Party Transactions’. All parties were asked by the Premier League about potential conflicts of interest and whether the sponsorship value of the shirt exceeded fair market value, which is a slippery concept in and of itself. The final sentence of this paragraph is: ‘The Premier League approved the deal after thorough scrutiny’.

That story, or a version of it, is how many people talk about Infinite Athlete. 

Charlie Ebersol’s responses to this narrative are really interesting, and I’ll leave you to have a listen and judge for yourself.

We then get to the other question, which is: WTF is Infinite Athlete?

Using Chelsea as a use case, Ebersol is good on the big problem of sports tech, which AI is about to make worse.

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