Startups are known for being one of the primary sources of business disruption, innovation and collaboration in nearly every vertical and industry on the planet. Startups do this out of necessity as they have to be different, fast, and partner to win. In turn, startups are continually poised to create unique products, solutions, models, etc. that will change the ways we interact, shop and live.
When a startup becomes a legendary company, like Adidas, they become a staple in their industry and in the world. They become an iconic brand that helps define sports, culture and what it means to continually be on a global stage. In parallel, that ever present requirement to be on the bleeding edge can become less clear as that startup approach and perspective is difficult to maintain.
Adidas and Starve Ups are exploring a strategic partnership like no accelerator in the world has done before. This isn’t about a 12 week cohort run by Starve Ups at Adidas where they pay us to find companies and to manage it. This isn’t about a demo day preparation by a bunch of CPG startups to Adidas executives. This is about a real partnership around innovation and collaboration.
In turn, we are kicking off this Adidas + Starve Ups initial event where we will explore what it would be like to create a partnership between one of the world’s most successful apparel, footwear and sports companies with the world’s only startup scalerator, end-to-end startup accelerator.
The partnership will begin now and will progress into a series of events where we build upon what the partnership would look like, what it would be called, how we would share knowledge, value and mentoring. In attendance at each event are Adidas executives and Starve Ups founders.
At each event we will have a Starve Ups founder speak to an area or two where their startup has excelled in innovation or collaboration. They will present how that innovation or collaboration approach has become a cornerstone of their company and their model and why they were able to make it effective.
We will then break into groups and discuss how we can individually work to innovate our own companies in similar capacities, how markets are moving towards this pin point the Starve Ups founder helped plant, and how we might be able to collectively collaborate on a product or solution with that company and Adidas on a grander scale.
