Emerging Demand for Specialized Digital Ecosystems

Carlos Ponce (00:13):

Good morning everyone. Welcome to another episode of Tech Leaders Unplugged. And this morning we are once again getting unplugged with our guest, Srini Siddiredy. He is the CEO and founder at Sports Plus, and he's going to tell us all about it. And then, of course, my fellow teammate and co-host Wade Erickson from here. So thank you gentlemen for being here with us today.

Srini Siddiredy (00:45):

Carlos and Wade, and everybody.

Carlos Ponce (00:47):

Thank you so much for being here, both of you. So let's start with you Srini. So tell us a little bit about your background where, you know, where you come from, you know, and then of course we're going to move on to the company. But tell us a little bit about you first, and then tell us about Sports Plus.

Srini Siddiredy (01:09):

Sure. Hello everyone tech Leaders. My name is Srini Siddiredy. I'm the founder and CEO of Sports Plus before starting Sports Plus, by education I was an engineer. And then after that I worked at various companies in various tech roles, mostly developing business applications. Then before starting Sports Plus, I was part of one of the startup, which took on unplugging, Craigslist but by the website we started was Ads Globe, where we want to provide a much better service for the classified. But at the end, did not work out, so we have to close it, move on. And after a few years in about eight, nine years ago then I started Sports Plus. So at that time I moved to the Bay Area, and my kids were very active in sports, so I was really connected with sports, and I was trying to see how my kids are performing. I was trying to see if there's a app where I can track their stats, their activities, their schedules and everything, but I couldn't find any. So as I was an engineer and I know how to develop these applications, I started developing one myself. Then I started slowly forming a team. Given my previous entrepreneurial connections, I was able to quickly form a team and get it going. At that time, I was working part-time, and after a few years I figured, okay, this can be a real business. So that's when I moved full-time and I started growing the team and growing the app and growing the business. So now here we are Sports plus serving so sports organizations to run all their operations. So it's a complete system a communication engine kind of a ERP, kind of a CRM. So all a sports organization will need, they'll get in Sports Plus to open their registration, collect payments. Then form teams then run leagues and tournaments. Then open their shop, then also Rise funds, then also their website and mobile app. Everything will come out of the platform. They can also track used to tryouts and evaluations and player stats, and also all the teams get their team app inbuilt with the system, with the account. So it's a all in one platform to run all their sports operations in one platform, one account where everything is connected and everybody's on the same page.

Carlos Ponce (04:03):

I see. Wow. Srini, well, that's quite a, that's quite a journey, you know, building Sports Plus from, from, from the ground up, you know, and from what you said, from what I'm hearing, is that there is still a lot you know, to be implemented and as the, the industry itself grows. But before we get into the nitty gritty of the industry itself tell us a little bit about the topic that you chose. Okay. So for today's conversation, you chose, let's see, you chose emerging demand for specialized digital ecosystems, improving productivity with the right network and connections. So first question that I have for you, Srini, is why did you choose this particular topic and why did you feel it was relevant for today's day and age? Can you start there, please?

Srini Siddiredy (05:00):

Sure. So as we are building Sports Plus and making it available for the sports organizations. So we realized that for especially sports, and this may apply to few other industries for example, in youth sports. So if you are your children register and join a club, the actual value will be delivered when they play a game or a tournament or a league with another club or team of the another club. So the value is not delivered in the organization, but the value is actually delivered when the player usually part of a team and engages and participates in a game and plays a game that involves another team from another club or league. So here, especially in sports world. So there's, there is a need for a lot of intercommunication between the clubs right now even until now. So most of the clubs, the way they do this is by making calls or sending emails. So very low tech way. So what we figured is there's a simple, there, there's to be a simple way for these clubs to communicate so that they can make all these sporting events happen, like either leagues, tournaments or even for example, even trading coaches or players or even sharing the equipment, sharing the facilities, sharing other required material or data for sports happen to make sports happen everywhere. So that's where we saw this need and and saw some demand where we, we need a, some kind of a tool or a channel where the sports staff can easily communicate, can easily publish a message, for example, to all other local sports clubs, let's say all other baseball clubs, all other football clubs, and easy, they can broadcast a message very easily. And also at the same time they can have a secured communication once somebody is interested in in certain post or event. So that, that's where we saw this need and demand for specialized digital ecosystems. We are applying this for sports, but I'm pretty confident the same can be applied in various other industries like travel hospitals restaurants. So where there's a, a need for these various organizations to work together and deliver services for their consumers.

Wade Erickson (08:04):

Oh, I think you're on mute.

Carlos Ponce (08:06):

Yes. I'm sorry about that. So thank you so much, Srini, Wade. I understand that you have some questions about sport team's management tools. Do you want to go ahead and take the mic?

Wade Erickson (08:17):

Yeah, so you know, in the beginning you said it, it, it really kind of came out of a, a personal need with your, your children and you started to kind of build your own trackers. I mean, obviously this, this industry had websites and schedules and stuff that people would've to stitch those together. Maybe the coach had a friend that was a webmaster or something, you know, and those are the early days, you know, back in you know, when these started to pop up. And then, like you said, it was very localized. What, what kind of drove the feature set as you started to expand the platform to go beyond the individual team then to the, the combined league maybe? And then I saw there's even features of governance and other kinds of you know, very high level to the, to bring the sophistication. And then also how do you come to the market with that? Do you really target the the clubs you know, the leagues or does it you target individual teams and have them bubble it up? Tell me a little bit about how you market so like this.

Srini Siddiredy (09:23):

Sure, good question. So my background, given that I'm from the tech background I'm not from the sports industry. I don't have lot of connections with the sports heavyweights. So I have to use my advantage, which is tech. So I had to build something that actually works and scales and works. So initially what we started as at the player level, so what, what an athlete needs, we, we, we built various tools for an athlete. Then I realized that it's, it's hard to market to athletes because they're underage and you cannot, you can target in some ways, but they're very expensive. And also as a business, there's not enough market. So then after implementing athlete management, then we added team management on top of that. So as various sports teams, they need an app for the communication, for access, for checking their other player details and also for access, their team schedules roster and all the team related stuff. So then we implemented a team management app. Then I, I realized that teams are seasonal, especially in new sports. They come and play for three months, six months, and after that they'll be gone. And next year, next season, a completely new team will be in place. So from a business point of view, I realized this is not the greatest thing.

Wade Erickson (11:06):

Yeah. Not as sticky as you want. Yeah.

Srini Siddiredy (11:08):

Yeah. So then after that, we started adding the organization management layer on top of it. So that way we, we grew the platform very in a organic way, very natural way where players, teams, then organization. So because organizations are kind of permanent, they last for at least a number of years. So I, we, we, we started building everything sports organization might need, for example, how do they collect registrations? How do they collect payments then? They need a website and they need a mobile app, right? So we started we, we built the organization management layer then so we used digital marketing where we spend a lot of time in making sure our website ranks on such engines and also on social media. We spend a lot of, we put a lot of efforts to on the digital marketing. So that's, excuse me, that's how we acquire majority of our customers, where our customers find us on Google binging and also sometimes on social media. And they, they come to us and then we give a demo, and then if everything goes well, they become our paid customers. So then as customers come for a demo, and a lot of times because sports sometimes there are lot number of sports and also certain things are done very differently in each sport and also each region. So lot of times these organizations, they come to us and ask, okay, I need it, do, do it this way. Can you guys provide this? So we collect most of the requirements from our customers before sales and after sales as they become our customers. So, and also given that sometimes some of the some the requirements may not fit our platform. So that's when we tell them that we, we can't do this because this won't fit our platform. So anything that fits our platform. So we, we implement it for our prospects, our customers. And sometimes what we do is some features may apply only to a specific set of customers, not for others. For example, some, some require, some features may apply only for tennis, but not for soccer. So what we do is we make it a configurable where, so whoever wants it, they can enable that feature, otherwise others won't see it. So that way we can have everything in one platform at the same time who, whoever wants it, they can only see those features, who don't want it, they're not, they'll not be whelmed with unnecessary features. So that, that's how we, we, we grew the platform and also even now, so our platform, we grew based on the customer requests.

Wade Erickson (14:00):

Great, great. So, can you share a little bit at the kind of the product road mapping process, because obviously that went through like various stages, athlete, then team, then organization. Was that like over a compressed period where you learned these things very fast in the first year? Or did you take a couple years to kind of keep building on top of your previous work and growing within the ecosystem, just expanding out to service a greater portion of that ecosystem?

Srini Siddiredy (14:31):

Okay. So it's normally, it takes years for us, for each area. It's not that, we follow agile development methodology where we start small and we've put out a small feature and sometimes make it available to some, our few, few other customers and then take their feedback then based on the feedback, we build it on top of that. So for us, for a feature to we started quickly, but for the feature to be fully implemented and fully available with all aspects, it usually takes, depending on the feature, it, it takes time where anywhere from a month to six months, for example, because we, we, we don't want to do it in the world way, the waterfall model, where we don't want to come up with all the requirements and thinking that this is what customer wants. So that's why we start out small knowing that the minimum basic things we know for sure, okay, this definitely a customer would need, whatever is the minimum basic feature functionality set, will go out and implement and make it available. And then based on the customer feedback, we built it on top of it.

Wade Erickson (15:54):

So tell me a little bit about the internet nationalization. Are you just in the US for now, or are you looking to go into Europe and then multi-language, and how has that affected some of your planning for the product and expansion?

Srini Siddiredy (16:07):

Yeah, so given a resource constraint startup, so we don't want to add a lot of overhead into the product development cycle. Because having the internationalization our localization from the beginning, it's going to add a lot of overhead. So it, it'll slow down overall product growth. That's why we decided just to focus on English speaking markets like us, uk, Canada, Australia, India. So again, we, we, we offer customization. For example a sports organization can be called a club, or a league or an academy or an association. It can be called anything. And also a game can be called a game or a match. So the team can be called a team or a group or depending on our class. So basically in sports, there are certain things that different sports and different regions use in different ways, even though at then they mean the same thing, but they use different words. So that's why we, we made it all optional, are customizable, what do you want to call a game? You want to call a game or a match or a fight, or a something else. So our customers, they can specify whatever they want to call it. So we have all that customization options inbuilt in the platform that supports all sports in all countries. But we did not implement the internal internalization or localization in the platform at this time, because that will slow down a lot. So now we are serving only the English speaking countries later at some point, maybe after rising <laugh> next round, next round of capital, maybe we'll take on the localization.

Carlos Ponce (18:04):

Srini, I have a question. I mean, you're talking about localizing, localization, and localizing alone comes with its own set of, of challenges because there are components that are non-technical in nature. For example, the language barriers and the differences and the nuances and the cultural issues, you know, all these things that could have a certain impact in adoption, right? So you, you also mentioned that for now you're only focused on English speaking countries, but even then there might be things that could, I mean, I'm just saying it's a big if, right? I'm not saying that they, that they are, but it's a big, if there could be hurdles, right? For example, let's say that we're talking about another English speaking country, could be the UK or I mean the England or Australia or whatever, but the, the sports themselves and the culture surrounding these sport sporting events is different, right? From, from one country to another. So are you, is this like, are you planning on taking steps towards homogenizing the, the, the precisely the, the, the platform and the tool, the app itself, so that it's going to work, you know, regardless of whether you're going to be promoting it and, and promoting the adoption?

Srini Siddiredy (19:24):

Yes, in a way, you're right. So on, you're on the point there. It's, it's correct that even within the us but for different sports they do certain things very differently. For example, even starting with the collecting registrations, some sports, they offer discounts for when multiple family members join, right? Some sports they want to, when they collect registrations, they want players to upload all their data, like data birth certificate or schools ID or various other documents. And some sports, they want to collect their digital signature. So even with the registration, so every organization is different, but in, especially in sports organizations, they want to do business and in, in many different ways as suit for their sport, for their region for their compliance. So we have seen it all <laugh>. So what, that's why we, we, our platform is highly customizable, where if you want to do in certain way, yes, you can achieve it by by setting a certain configuration in a right way, and also by adding certain data. So however you want it. So the platform supports all that customization to achieve however you want to do it.

Carlos Ponce (20:47):

Okay. Thank you so much, Srini. Okay, Wade back to you.

Wade Erickson (20:52):

Yeah, so I was thinking about the data collection here. So, you know, obviously you talked early on, you were concerned about stats and, you know, points scored who scored them, you know, the you know, who passed the ball to get the, you know, assist credits and all that. What do you, architecturally and technologically, how, how do you collect those stats? Is it all manually entered from some some game tracker person, or do you have other devices that you've actually integrated with through APIs that maybe could actually be storing it live and passing that data up in real time into the system? Tell me a little bit about integrations.

Srini Siddiredy (21:33):

Oh, excellent question. So right now we have it what we have it is the manual process where after a game, a coach would come and enter for each player and also for the game, what the game scores, and also recap, and also who is the M V P and also various stats for the game based on that game. So for example, how many goals scored, how many assays or how many kilometers somebody miles, somebody ran. Our, what our system allows for each organization to configure whatever metrics they want to capture for a game and for a practice, or in general. So for a game, let's say you, your baseball organization than for baseball, you want to capture certain metrics. Like if, if it's a pitcher, like number of balls pitched in a game and strikeouts, right? And if it's a runner, right? So what, whatever is I mean, if it's a hitter, whatever is a hitter stats you want to capture. So Sports Plus allows to configure all these metrics for each organization, however, and whatever they want to capture. So there's a highly customizable option there, which organizations use to customize whatever they want to capture. So this process is all manual process after the game, or a, even if they're running tryouts after a tryout, they can go and enter various stats for the tryouts for all the players, register for the tryouts. So all that is customizable and it is done manually now, right? So that's one part. So later on we have plans to integrate with the sudden devices. Again there are two types of devices. One is a very generic device that is used, generally used for fitness, like number of steps or distance ran or heartbeat and various other things. These are general fitness devices. So there are so many of them, 20 plus, so some of them as APIs. And also there are some companies they provide a common a p i that connects all these devices. So later we have plans to integrate these third party services that allows any player with any device connect, and then their stats will be transferred into the system. So that is for general purpose stats. Then there are sport specific stats. So again, this area is not mature, and for each sport there are a few companies that provide the wearable devices that tracks various stats for that sport. And so I see that there's some little bit movement in that space, but that space is still wide open and still stabilizing and players are coming and going. But once that space where players stabilize and somebody comes with a good a p a and all those things, we are planning to integrate the sports specific tracker devices with sports Plus at that point all those data from those tracking devices will be directly synced with us with the Sports Plus account, and they can see all the charts and all the various performance metrics, everything within, just within the Sports Plus as well. So to answer your question, so right now what we have is highly customizable manual entry process, but as probably first quarter of 2024, we are going to start integrating with these devices that are available in the market.

Wade Erickson (25:10):

Great. Great. I just have one last question. So we talked a little bit about this being your second you know, venture that you've launched. What, what were probably some of the highlights of the difference between the first venture and the second venture that you learned in that process that you could maybe share with the audience as a lesson learned?

Srini Siddiredy (25:32):

Sure. So my first venture is something like how to put it. So we, we don't know a lot of things. We don't know what works. We don't know what doesn't work. So we went in and started doing something and in the process it's, it's like my bachelor's degree. And we did a lot of things on what works, what doesn't work, when it is not working, why it's not working, and also what is important in the beginning, what is important in the mid cycle of product. And so there, there's so many things that it's hard to learn outside without making your hands dirty. So given that even my, me and my co-founder in the first venture, we both are fresh and first time, so we don't know a lot of these things. So it's even though it was frustrating and we lost money and all those things at the end we couldn't have had that kind of education from any other institution. So so it, it is well worth it, even though we went through pain points. But at the end we learned a lot. And then of course, that helped us to for the, my second startup now. So, yeah, so it's, it's always these things are never ending. Even when you learn something, things always change. So it's a, it's a marathon. It's not a sprint. So always one has to open to seeing everything and learning at every stage of the company. But nothing is easy. So obviously startups are very hard and most of them will fail. So once those succeed so that's where the real joy is. And as a founder, you have, you'll have to succeed only in one right? To, to, to realize to the benefits and everything. So you can fail in five, but if you succeed in one, that will bring a lot of joy and wealth and everything. So that's, that's, that's what my thinking is. Yeah. So even if it fails, I'm gonna start the next one. So having that mindset and always open to new ideas and always open to the idea that something could fail. So that will, that's what kept me going. And even the first one doesn't deter me. So now we're here and obviously there's a lot more to learn, a lot more to achieve. But the lessons, basically, I would leave it, if I have to say in one word, the lessons learned, that's very valuable. And I have used many of them in my second startup.

Wade Erickson (28:32):

So the bottom line is get started, maybe start a little smaller. Don't try to go take on Uber your first go around and expect to learn a lot along the way. But the best thing is to just get started because you, you can read a lot of books, but once you do it, that's when the, the real nuances are felt.

Srini Siddiredy (28:56):

Yeah, that's correct.

Wade Erickson (28:57):

Alright, Carlos, I, I think we're getting close to the top of the hour.

Carlos Ponce (29:03):

Indeed. Wade, and unfortunately we're coming up on time, right? But before we go, I'd like to make a just a quick announcement of what's coming. That's going to be tomorrow, actually tomorrow, right here on Tech Leaders Unplugged. We are going to be speaking with James Hamed, the founder and CEO of this, of Vista Labs. The topic is going to be successfully land launching AI in medicine, AI in medicine, patient protection and clinical excellence. So that's what we have for tomorrow, right here on Tech Leaders Unplugged at 9:30 AM Pacific. Don't forget to join us. And then, of course last but not least, a big thank you to our guest, Srini Siddiredy and of course, Wade as ever. So see you next time right here on Tech Leaders Unplugged.

Srini Siddiredy (30:02):

It's really, I have a really nice time talking to you both Wade and Carlos.

Wade Erickson (30:07):

We appreciate your time. For sure. Thank you so much.

Carlos Ponce (30:10):

We'll be in touch. Thank you so much everyone, have a great day and see you all tomorrow right here on Tech Leaders Unplugged. Thank you.