IN THE NEWS
High-tech startup AthletixNation is hoping for score big
Jason Gertzen, The Kansas City Star, March 18, 2009.
Morgan State and Chattanooga aren’t the only Cinderella teams heading to this year’s Big Dance with big dreams.
AthletixNation, a high-tech startup in Lenexa, is unleashing a furious full-court press of its own to gain momentum during this year’s NCAA basketball tournament.
The firm founded by Davyeon Ross is relying on its “Bracket Challenge” contest to promote its technology providing college sports video and advertising for radio, newspaper and other local media Web sites. In some ways it is matching up against the North Carolinas, Dukes and Louisvilles of the media world such as ESPN and CBS that have their own sports video and related promotions.
To varying degrees, local media have yet to take complete advantage of their Web sites in generating substantial and rapidly growing advertising sales.
“People are so passionate about sports,” said Ross, chief executive officer of the fledgling technology company. “It’s a tremendous audience, but they haven’t really capitalized on it.”
Beyond opportunities AthletixNation might help create for the media industry, the firm also is part of another emerging story line in this region.
Ross is among a new generation of technology entrepreneurs being nurtured with hope of creating clusters of fast-growing companies and more jobs.
Kansas ranked eighth in the nation for a key factor known as “gazelle jobs” in a recent report assessing which states have the best positioned economies. So-called gazelle firms tally sales growth of 20 percent or more for four straight years. Some researchers calculated that these businesses generate as much as 80 percent of the jobs created by entrepreneurs.
“There aren’t that many gazelles, but they account for the lion’s share of job creation,” said Rob Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. “Most small companies don’t create jobs.”
While every state wants to be the home of the next Google, one of the most prominent examples of a gazelle firm, it can be an inexact science about how best to help local ventures achieve that kind of success.
States would make a good start in this direction, though, in spurring innovation by helping companies and encouraging entrepreneurship, said Atkinson, a co-author of the 2008 State New Economy Index.
During a recent visit, Atkinson learned more about university initiatives, the Kansas Bioscience Authority and the Kansas Technology Enterprise Corp., or KTEC. These efforts, he said, probably are contributing to the success the state has enjoyed in stimulating the entrepreneurial segment of the regional economy.
“It is those companies that really do drive growth,” Atkinson said. “Kansas has focused a lot on that.”
One of these programs is KTEC’s Pipeline entrepreneurial fellowship program.
Ross is participating in this year’s Pipeline class. The program is a business boot camp of sorts intended to refine strategy, financing pitches, marketing approaches and other critical elements that could help decide the fate of some of the state’s most promising technology startups.
His firm also worked with KTEC while raising money last year from wealthy people known as angel investors. So far AthletixNation has raised a little more than $1 million.
Ross moved to this region when he attended Atchison’s Benedictine College where he played basketball and earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science.
The Trinidad native began his career as a software engineer with Sprint and later took a position as a lead technical consultant for a company called eVergence. In 2007 Ross started his own company.
AthletixNation has obtained rights to show video segments of certain college sports and developed a technology system that allows other Web sites to display the video. AthletixNation sells ads and the newspaper, radio or other Web sites also have the chance to sell ads connected to the sports video.
The company’s Bracket Challenge promotion is being used by about 100 publications, including The Kansas City Star. The idea, Ross said, is that these clients will be see how the AthletixNation technology works and will consider future commercial relationships with the company.
KFAN, a Minneapolis radio station, used a different firm for its online NCAA tournament brackets the past few years, but agreed to try AthletixNation this time. Some of the features such as being able to drag and drop two opposing teams to display statistics about the potential match-up seemed innovative, said Chad Abbott, KFAN program director.
“What we are looking for is something to differentiate us from all the other brackets,” Abbott said. “We want to keep it fresh.”
AthletixNation is based in the Enterprise Center of Johnson County, one of the region’s top incubators for young technology companies.
The vast potential of the markets AthletixNation aims to tap, the high quality of the technology the company has developed and the approach Ross is taking has left a number of local investors intrigued by the startup’s potential, said Joel Wiggins, president and CEO of the enterprise center.
“He is not looking to create a little company,” Wiggins said. “He wants to make this big.”
Ross has an impressive command of his company’s technology, a good business background and a strong creative drive, said Scott McCormick, one of the founders of Kansas City-based VML Inc. who now serves as the chief vision officer for the full-service digital marketing agency.
In serving as a mentor to Ross as he participates in the Pipeline fellowship program, McCormick said it will be critical to help direct focus on the strategy with the greatest potential. AthletixNation has multiple opportunities for making money, but a focused approach will be key for a small startup.
“Davyeon sees opportunity everywhere he turns because he is so creative,” McCormick said. “Creating the proper focus, finding the proper revenue model and taking that to market, we are in a good position to help him figure that out.”
Mentors such as McCormick tend to be accomplished business leaders in the region who often have hectic schedules managing their own companies.
When McCormick was beginning as an entrepreneur, others in the community offered advice and assistance that allowed him to get his new business off the ground.
Helping someone such as Ross, McCormick said, is a way to give back by assisting a fellow entrepreneur and the region at the same time.
“We have some good people with smart ideas in Kansas City,” McCormick said. “I want them to succeed.”
To reach Jason Gertzen, call 816-234-4899 or send e-mail to jgertzen@kcstar.com.
