Hosted at the Carlson School of Management’s Gary S. Holmes Centre for Entrepreneurship, the one-day event ran from 9am until 9pm and included 27 participants, divided into eight teams, all striving to create new and improved services and products for the sports industry using Sportradar’s market-leading data.

The event, held regularly across Europe in recent years, offers a chance for students and young innovators to compete for cash prizes while also giving them an opportunity to network and gain contacts within the sports and technology industries.

Winning team The Edge – comprised of James Seils, Greg Kajewski and Tim Rosener – claimed the bulk of the $3,000 prize pool with their customer-centric driven technology platform aimed at transforming the experience of sports betting.

The second place team was the Falcons, whose team consisted of Gowtham RajaRam, Vuppalapati Sai and Sushanth Gaddam. This team explored the premise of advertisements driven by live sports data.

In the bronze medal position was the 3 Under team, with Michael Fowler, Evan Wise and Kyle Farmer using data as a way to modernize how fans interact with professional golf.

Sportradar’s Innovation Director, Javier Altamirano, said: “The Innovation Challenge continues to go from strength to strength and it was a real pleasure to be able to bring it to the States for the first time. We saw some really creative approaches to powering sports products and services with sports data and all the participants can be really proud of themselves.”

John Stavig, Director at the Gary S. Holmes Center for Entrepreneurship, said: “The University of Minnesota greatly enjoyed hosting the Innovation Challenge, and appreciate the investment Sportradar made in our students and community by organising this event.  The student teams developed very credible ideas and benefited from the mentoring from Sportradar executives.  This event complements our students’ education by introducing new opportunities and connections in a very engaging and practical manner.”

Dr. Malte Siegle, Head of Sportradar’s University and Research Program, added: “Saturday was a fantastic occasion for all involved and it wouldn’t have been possible without support from our partners at the University of Minnesota. Our University Program is key to connecting Sportradar with the next generation of innovation talent and we’re looking forward to continuing the program’s development alongside the continued growth of the Innovation Challenge.”

Stay tuned to the Innovation Challenge website for details of future Innovation Challenge events.