Sportfin is a digital platform for community-based sports clubs, developed by Siddesh Iyer to help clubs raise funds more effectively. Here, Siddesh shares the ups and downs of launching his business.

What sparked the idea for the business?


Sport has had a huge impact on my life. It basically defined who I am.

It started when I was nine or 10 years old and my school counsellor encouraged me to play football. I absolutely loved it. But it also helped me to build awareness of others and this is the sort of thing that we help clubs to quantify.

So, for example, if you play a team sport, it doesn’t matter how good you are, you have to find a way to work with others. It has an impact on pro-social and anti-social behaviour and the sort of person you become.

I really value community sports clubs. I’ve seen them struggle to raise money time and time again despite the tremendous value they generate, so I really wanted to work towards building something that helps organisations like these raise money.

How does Sportfin work?

It gives clubs access to management software, which helps them collect data on participation and volunteering. This drives the impact reporting and allows clubs to fundraise better.

Whether they’re seeking funding from local authorities, from an organisation like Tesco Community Grants, or even the North East Local Enterprise Partnership, often these funders need to see evidence of the outcomes their funding has helped achieve, and Sportfin gives clubs a way to capture this.

They can track the number of people who are taking part in activities and correlate this with outcomes such as physical and mental health improvements, which can then be presented as an impact report which correlates with the scoring mechanism of the funder.

What have been the ups and downs of the first year?

A high point has been the amount of interest we’ve had. We’ve got a waiting list and are adding three clubs a week.

Still, it can feel overwhelming and stressful but I do feel like I’ve achieved something, and that feeling that comes through achieving something that’s very hard to do means I would do it all again.

What’s next for Sportfin?

We’re currently working on estimation of magnitude of impact through the data we collect. This will then help us build our impact scoring mechanism, which will help funders determine the likelihood of outcomes being generated through funding a club or a specific set of clubs.

This scoring mechanism will also help us drive many innovative ‘impact investment solutions’ into sport, such as social impact bonds.

Looking back, what would you tell others about starting a business?

Speak to people and most of all speak to other founders. They might have information to share that could seem very simple but given at the right time could change the whole way that you think and the way you operate. The amount of support I’ve had for the business has been massive.

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