And just like that, we’re back.
We hope you had a great holiday break.
It’s a quieter week across the sports investment landscape with the new year kicking off, which makes it a good time to zoom out and review what happened last year.
So, instead of a standard recap, this edition we’ll highlight the biggest stories, deals, and partnerships from the past year to set the table for 2026.
Weekly recaps will resume next Sunday.
Thank you for coming along the ride with us throughout 2025, and here’s to bigger and better things to come!
📰 TOP STORY
Biggest Sports Investment Stories In 2025
From billion-dollar funds to record-breaking valuations, 2025 was another year of non-stop news in the sports asset class. Below is our brief recap of some of the most impactful stories that shaped the industry over the past year, in no particular order:
Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith launched a $1 billion tech fund focused on sports & entertainment companies (more here).
Goldman Sachs acquired a majority stake in prominent sports agency Excel Sports Management at a $1 billion valuation (more here).
Longtime sports executive Dave Checketts launched a $1.2 billion sports fund, along with the Eccles family of Utah, focused on professional and collegiate teams, leagues, governing bodies, stadiums and arenas, sports technology, media rights, and broadcasting ventures (more here).
Toto Wolff, Mercedes F1 CEO and team principal, sold 15% of his ownership stake in the team at a $6 billion valuation, to Crowdstrike CEO George Kurtz (more here).
Allwyn, a multi-national lottery operator, acquired a majority stake in the US’s leading sports picks app, PrizePicks, for $1.6 billion (more here).
Leading private equity firm CVC formed Global Sports Group Fund, a $14 billion fund, consolidating CVC’s sports holdings and doubling down on opportunities in global leagues (more here).
Leading sports betting operator, DraftKings, acquired predictions market platform Railbird for $250 million, diving headfirst into the prediction market wave (more here).
Global Sports Capital Partners invested $100 million into Liga de Fútbol Americano, México's premier professional American football league (more here).
Saudi Arabia’s PIF, Silver Lake & Affinity Partners took sports gaming company EA Sports private in a $55 billion deal (more here).
The University of Utah becomes the first school to welcome private equity with its partnership with Otro Capital (more here).
💰MERGERS & MONEY MOVES
Biggest Sports Funding Rounds In 2025
Sports tech funding in 2025 hit over $4 billion. Here are some of the largest public funding rounds announced, sorted from highest to lowest:
• Kalshi raised $1 billion. (more here).
• ŌURA raised $900 million. (more here).
• CR Fitness Holdings raised $350 milion. (more here).
• Unrivaled Basketball raised $340 million. (more here).
• Teamworks raised $235 million. (more here).
• TicketManager raised $110 million. (more here).
• Rocket Youth raised $100 million. (more here).
• World Sevens Football raised $100 million. (more here).
• Aescape raised $83 million. (more here).
• PLAYTOMIC raised $70 million. (more here).
• Underdog raised $70 million. (more here).
• CourtReserve raised $54 million. (more here).
• Good Good Golf raised $45 million. (more here).
• Professional Triathletes Organisation raised $40 million. (more here).
• Fastbreak.AI raised $40 million. (more here).
• Scorability raised $40 million. (more here).
🤝 PARTNERSHIPS & COLLABORATIONS
Most Notable Sports Partnerships In 2025
Several pretty significant partnerships were also formed, which shook up the ecosystem. Here are a few of the most newsworthy ones announced in 2025:
• F1 & Apple partnership. (more here).
• Unrivaled Basketball & Samsung partnership. (more here).
• UFC & Meta partnership. (more here).
• Robinhood & Kalshi partnership. (more here).
• IBM & Ferrari partnership. (more here).
• San Antonio Spurs & Ledger partnership. (more here).
• SURJ Sports Investment & Kings League partnership. (more here).
• MLB & Athletes Unlimited partnership. (more here).
• EA Sports & The Athletic partnership. (more here).
• Netflix & Barstool Sports partnership. (more here).
👀 ATHLETES & OTHER NEWS
Biggest Athlete News In 2025
Athletes becoming entrepreneurs, creators, and investors is no longer an anomaly. It’s the norm. Here are some of the biggest athlete-related investments and acquisitions that were made in 2025:
• Coco Gauff invested in Unrivaled Basketball. (more here).
• Ryan Kalil & Blake Griffin acquired a majority stake in an American football team in Mexico. (more here).
• Tom Brady acquired 50% stake in CardVault. (more here).
• Serena Williams joined the Toronto Tempo ownership group. (more here).
• Sabrina Ionescu invested in Bay FC. (more here).
• Kylian Mbappe acquired a stake in the French SailGP team. (more here).
• Russell Westbrook invested in Wheeler Bio. (more here).
• David Beckham & Gary Neville acquired Salford City. (more here).
• Peyton Manning joined the Denver NWSL Ownership Group. (more here).
• Bobby Wagner joined the Seattle Storm ownership group. (more here).
• Angel Reese joined The TOGETHXR ownership group. (more here).
• Ball Brothers became equity partners in Betr. (more here).
• Chris Paul joined the Angel City FC ownership group. (more here).
• Caleb Williams invested in Boston Legacy FC. (more here).
• Jimmy Butler joined San Diego Wave as a minority investor. (more here).
• Travis Kelce invested in Six Flags Entertainment. (more here).
• JuJu Watkins joined the Boston Legacy FC ownership group. (more here).
• Cristiano Ronaldo invested in Perplexity AI. (more here).
• Stephon Castle invested in CT Sports Group. (more here).
• Ja Morant acquired a stake in Levallois Metropolitans Basketball Club. (more here).
🎙️ PODCAST INTERVIEWS
Breaking The Language Barrier In Sports With Akshat Prakash, CTO At CAMB.AI
This week’s guest on the Vetted Sports podcast is Akshat Prakash.
Akshat Prakash is the CTO and Co-founder of CAMB.AI.
CAMB.AI is a leading AI speech translation company that enables the world's biggest sports leagues, broadcasters, studios, and creators to go multi-lingual, at scale, in over 140 languages and locales.
In this episode, we discuss:
‣ How CAMB.AI entered the sports industry
‣ Why there needs to be more education around AI use in sports
‣ The future of AI in sports and how sports organizations are leveraging it
What'd you think of today's edition?
This newsletter is for informational purposes only and is not financial or business advice in any capacity. The information shared is our thoughts & opinions and does not represent the opinions of any other person, business, entity, or sponsor. The contents of this newsletter also should not be used in any public or private domain without the author's express permission.