The Players Fund announces the UK’s first athlete-led venture capital fund

The Players Fund is pioneering a new frontier in venture capital as the UK’s first athlete-led firm, founded by athletes, to empower the athlete community as investors.

The first-of-its-kind strategy brings together a collective of renowned athlete investors alongside seasoned VCs, leveraging their combined expertise, global access to opportunities and value creation ability, to support exceptional entrepreneurs and accelerate the future of athlete investing.

Established by an unrivalled team of world-class sportspeople and industry leaders, including cricket stars Ben Stokes, KL Rahul, Stuart Broad, Jos Buttler, and footballers Chris Smalling, Serge Gnabry and Héctor Bellerín together with over a dozen more athletes, The Players Fund aims to bridge the gap between the off field lives of sportspeople and startups.

With ownership in the firm and providing capital as their commitment, founding athletes have skin in the game and operational input.

The operating format is heavily shaped by sportspeople, with founding athlete partners designing a proprietary structure that maximises the impact of its athlete centric strategy by prioritising deal sourcing, access to premium investment rounds, and athlete driven value creation post investment.

The Players Fund’s unique approach to venture capital marks a significant departure from traditional investment models with the implementation of an athlete committee to support the operational and technical teams. The Players Fund seeks to go one step beyond existing collectives investing on a case by case basis or platforms that enable investments from athletes on an ad hoc basis.

Brought together by ex-athlete brothers Fergus and Ruari Bell, the distribution focused firm represents a new frontier in VC. By incorporating athletes into the venture process, portfolio companies benefit from increased athlete engagement, advocacy, and perspectives that in turn unlock exponential growth in the nascent stages of a business.

Commenting on the launch Fergus and Ruari Bell, managing partners at The Players Fund said: “We’re entering a new phase of athlete involvement in enterprise. As athletes seek to better leverage the power of their profile and go beyond endorsement into ownership, the athlete community has been crying out for a trusted destination to invest together into best in class startups.

“By uniting leading athlete investors and athlete collectives from the UK, EU and India under one roof, we now have that outlet in The Players Fund.”

By Mark Adair – Correspondent, Bdaily

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