New technology from startup ventures is transforming the global sports industry. This Startup Series has introduced over 200 startup companies in the sports technology space to a broader audience by allowing Founders of promising new ventures to tell their story and pitch their idea. Feel free to submit your startup’s answers to the below questions or contact us if you know of a startup that should be considered for inclusion in this series.
Company name: FanBrags
Founder(s): Bala Natarajan
Headquarters: Santa Monica, California
1. What is your elevator pitch?
FanBrags is an exciting Real-time Social Sports Fan app that enables ALL sports fans (hardcore, casual,..) to Brag against each other (on the second screen) LIVE while rooting for their teams during game-time – all for 100% Bragging rights only, without any money. It’s a game within a game!
2. Problem & Solution
Problem: Sports Fans have been flooded with Daily Fantasy apps or recently Real-time Fantasy apps. Static or Daily or Real-time, fantasy apps are driven by money. Even though more sports data is being made available every year by the leagues, that data reaches more hardcore sports fans in different forms of fantasy or paid apps. A significant segment of the emerging millennial sports fan market –i.e. the casual/newbie sports fan who has a liking for a sport – for the social angle, for the fun of it or just wanting to learn about it, is being left behind.
Solution: We at FanBrags are all in…for something better than money. Bragging rights! FanBrags enables Fans of all levels – experienced, casual, newbies, men, women, everyone..to join the fun by throwing fun brags at each other – based on skill-based predictions during the live game – at opposing team fans, friends or frenemies anywhere in the world (whether they are checked in to a sports bar, stadium or a tailgating party at a friend’s house). Every brag is for points-only and can be shared with a fan’s own social network with a single-click. Brags results are shown on a competitive social leaderboard that has multiple views including global, facebook-friends, game-watching-location, fan-base.
In a nutshell, with FanBrags, we are taking the game-day fan experience – beyond fantasy league players – into a much bigger global audience – by providing a fun, risk-free, competitive gamified fan experience platform, for every sports fan.
3. Market
NFL Football fans for first release in 2016-17. Cricket, NBA, NHL, MLB fans globally in future releases in 2017-18. Our vision is to be a global, multi-sport gamified fan experience platform for sports fans of all ages and demographics. If you are passionate about a team or a player, we want you throwing fun brags on FanBrags!
4. Business Model
Our vision is to be the go-to second-screen app for all sports fans on game-day by providing an engaging gamified experience of live sports data and also enabling fun, risk-free fan2fan game-time engagement. Towards this vision, in our future release, our app will serve context-relevant sports advertisements that enable brands to reach sports fans in real-time moments when their product matters to the fan. In this model, our customer gets to see Ads that are relevant to their fan experience, brands reach customers in high-impact windows and we deliver a profitable advertising model that is aligned with our vision.
5. Management Team
Bala Natarajan : Chief Executive Offer (CEO)
Ramesh Chetty: Chief Operations Officer (COO)
Cedric Morris : Chief Fan Officer (CFO)
Siva Nagalingam : Startup Mentor
6. Anything else you want the audience to know about your venture?
FanBrags is proud to be a Made-in-LA story – a mix of entrepreneurial tech geeks, sports fans, creative artists coming together organically in a small self-funded startup…and starting to make big things happen.
Beverly Sherman, Seattle Seahawks’ Cornerback Richard Sherman’s mother (a.k.a: “Mama Sherman”), created a promotional video for us – celebrating the app.