Str8bat raised $3.5 Mn in a Series A funding round led by Exfinity Venture Partners, aiming to revolutionise athlete training and performance tracking, particularly in cricket.
Str8bat's patented technology, including the "smart willow" cricket bat, uses IoT devices to track key performance metrics like bat speed and impact speed.
The company, founded by Gagan Daga, Rahul Nagar, and Madhusudan R, is expanding internationally, with plans to enter markets in the UK, South Africa, and the US, while also eyeing other sports like tennis, golf, and badminton.
Sportstech startup Str8bat has secured $3.5 Mn (around INR 29.4 Cr) as a part of its Series A funding round led by Exfinity Venture Partners.
The round also saw participation from RTL, Eternal Capital and VCats Group, along with existing investors Techstars and SucSEED Indovation Fund.
With this fresh infusion, the Bengaluru-based company seeks to boost training and performance tracking of athletes, particularly cricketers.
Founded by Gagan Daga, Rahul Nagar and Madhusudan R in 2017, Str8bat claims to have developed a patented sportstech platform that offers athletes with real-time data analytics.
The startup counts Rajasthan Royals, Cricket Australia and SG Cricket among its clients. Meanwhile, SG Cricket has partnered with Str8bat to roll out “world’s first smart willow.”
For the uninitiated, ‘the smart willow’, a cricket bat with an IoT device, delivers advanced shot tracking without the need for cameras. It enables players at all levels to access actionable insights and performance recommendations.
“Even a small change in bat angle, for instance, improved an IPL player’s bat speed by 21% and impact speed by 27%,” Daga told Inc42. “This technology, the first of its kind, aims to democratise sports training, making elite-level feedback accessible to all players.”
“The primary purpose of this funding round is to facilitate our go-to-market expansion,” he said, adding that the round was oversubscribed.
Currently, the company has its primary market in India with an overseas office in Australia. It also plans to expand its footprint to UK, US and South Africa.
On the sustainability of the business, Daga said, “We firmly believe that to build a scalable model, growth must be profitable. We closely monitor our unit economics to ensure we remain gross positive.”
Looking ahead, he added that within the next five years, India will account for approximately 45-50% of the company’s revenue, with the remaining coming from international markets.
Str8bat aims to have over a million players on its platform within five years. Daga claims that the platform has already recorded over a couple of million shots, with around 400 elite-level players currently using Str8bat.
This comes on the heart of sportstech industry gaining a lot of traction from investors for quite sometime now.
For instance, in February, sportstech startup SportVot raised INR 9.4 Cr in a Pre-Series A funding round.
In June, sports and fitness tech startup Machaxi raised INR 4.8 Cr in a Pre-Series A funding round.
In July, sportstech platform KheloMore raised $2 Mn in a Pre-Series A funding round.
According to Inc42 data, domestic sportstech startups have collectively raised $139 Mn across 29 funding deals between 2014 and November 2022.
While recently, Major OTT platforms like Disney+Hotstar, JioCinema, SonyLiv and Amazon Prime have been bullish on expanding their presence in the sports streaming space.
While the focus of these platforms is on streaming tournaments with massive fanfares like Indian Premier League, ICC India matches, among others, SportsVot focuses more on niche sports like Squash, badminton, basketball among others.
Doing so, it primarily competes with FanCode. FanCode recently partnered with Amazon Prime to expand its streaming services on Prime’s streaming platform.
