White Rose Sports Management, the golf management agency co-founded by Manchester City footballer James Milner, has invested in UpGame, an India-based golf improvement app.
The sports performance application helps golfers analyse their game and understand their strengths and weaknesses. It generates and uses a variety of critical stats through which a player is able to track his/her performance on the golf course via a map-based interface and unique metrics, that are shareable between player and coach via the app itself.
UpGame’s popularity is growing rapidly amongst elite and casual golfers with a desire to improve. The app has seen 15-fold growth in its monthly revenues since January this year, retaining more than 85% of its users as it expands across geographies.
In the last couple of months, players utilising the app scored three wins in the space of two weeks on the two biggest Tours in the world. Australian Lucas Herbert and compatriot Cam Davis won the Dubai Duty Free Irish Open and the Rocket Mortgage Classic on the European and the PGA Tours’ respectively. A week later, Min Woo Lee triumphed at the Scottish Open.
UpGame has also signed up several National Federations including Golf Australia, Norwegian Golf Federation, Singapore Golf Association, Hong Kong Golf Association, Sports Authority of Thailand, Finland and several European national teams. Winners on the PGA, LPGA, European Tour and Majors, as well as leading NCAA US college teams, are also key users of UpGame.
James Milner, co-founder of White Rose Sports Management, said: “The use of data and analytics have become hugely important in nearly all sports. The staff and players at White Rose all appreciate the importance analytics provide in improving and contributing to the performance of individuals and teams.”
“From the moment we discussed the ethos of White Rose Sports Management, we wanted performance to be at the heart of everything we did. And this aspect was very apparent in the UpGame team in our initial interactions. We love their vision of bringing performance improvement to athlete’s around the world, the team’s intense focus, quick execution and their deep insights on their users. We are delighted to be a part of their journey”, commented Matthew Buck, Director of White Rose Sports Management.
Sameer Sawhney, founder and CEO of UpGame, said: “Last year proved to be critical for UpGame. Our entire team was able to double down our focus on the product and in spite of the challenges of travel, we have become the product of choice in every continent. For example, with college season kicking in the US, we cannot sign up teams fast enough. We are excited to replicate our success in golf to other sports and be at the centre of learning and performance improvement in the growing sports technology space.”
