Nine companies, with products ranging from wearable health devices to stadium management software, travelled to San Francisco and Los Angeles last month (September) as part of the South Australian Government’s Sportstech Export Capability Initiative.
Developed in partnership with the Australian Sports Technologies Network (ASTN), the initiative was designed to help South Australia’s burgeoning sportstech industry accelerate their exports into the growing US market.
The visit leveraged opportunities for South Australian sportstech companies ahead of the 2028 Olympics and Paralympic Games in Los Angeles and the 2032 Olympics in Brisbane.
The US trip included site visits to iconic US sports venues and meetings with US sports organisations and sportstech companies, with business matching and investment opportunities.
“South Australia is home to a high proportion of fast-scaling growth companies that are already export-ready,” said Amy Crosland, Chief Operating Officer at the Australian Sports Technologies Network.
“Combined with the state’s strengths in industrial technologies, there is significant potential for cross-sector collaboration and the transfer of knowledge, skills and expertise.
“This mission provides an important opportunity to showcase South Australian innovation to the world’s largest sports market and build pathways for sustained international growth.”
The companies are looking to follow in the footsteps of South Australian sportstech export success story, MyVenue, which joined the mission as a mentor company.
MyVenue, founded in 2020 in Adelaide, provides a cloud-based point-of-sale technology that powers billions of dollars in transactions at hundreds of sports and entertainment venues across the US.
The company recently signed a partnership and major investment with family office and growth equity firm, Greater Sum Ventures (GSV), fuelling further global growth and in-house software development in Adelaide.
Thanks to the widespread adoption of technology in the sports and entertainment industries, sports technology has grown immensely, with a recent report by ASTN stating that Australia’s sports technology sector had surpassed AUD$5 billion in revenue, now equal in value to the country’s fintech sector and employing almost 18,000 people.
The US was chosen as a priority market for companies looking to expand internationally, given it is home to more than 65 per cent of the world’s sportstech investors.
To prepare for the trip, the South Australian companies have taken part in workshops and mentoring to develop their export market plans in preparation for entering the US market.
Participating in the trip were the following South Australian companies:
- Cellr
- Earthling 3.0
- Rubber Side Down
- Sportal
- Swaarm Global
- CME Group
- Your Brain Health
- My Venue
- Lumin Sports
