Jamaican-led Sports App Startup Run Live gets Investment and leAD Accelerator Spot

RUNLive Sports App founded by entrepreneurs Mike Thompson and David Mullings have been chosen as  one of ten startups selected from over 400 applicants to participate in the 2018 cohort of the leAD Sports Accelerator in Berlin, Germany. In September they head to Berlin for a 90 day programme and €100,000 investment for 8% of the company with a post-money valuation of €1.25 million.

RunLive, which currently has over 1500 users in the public beta and available for the iOS platform, differentiates itself by being one of the world’s first gamified social running platforms. Runners across the world can connect and match instantly to compete in real-time, while being rewarded for their triumphs and the miles they cover. The app offers instant motivation and around-the-clock competition powered by patent-pending algorithms, in-run voice chat and audio-guided feedback.

“We were very specific about the kind of accelerator we wanted to apply to and leAD was the best choice based on our target market combined with their strong suite of mentors, coaches and partners” said Mike Thompson, a former Development Operations Engineer, who came up with the idea for the app 2 years ago.  RunLive has mostly been self-funded with a small friends and family round coordinated by co-founder David Mullings, also a Jamaican entrepreneur.

Both entrepreneurs are based in Miami, Florida and were introduced to each other  by a Florida angel investor group to help him scale and was really impressed with his product. “ I committed to help raise capital and invest but got sucked in by his drive and the product roadmap” said co-founder David Mullings who is also a mentor with the Branson Center of Entrepreneurship Caribbean and Founder Institute Jamaica.

leAD Sports was founded by Klaus, Horst and Stefan Bente, grandsons of Adi Dassler, the founder of Adidas. The  other startups who are part of leAD Sports Accelerator’s Class of 2018 are:

– Weairable from Israel

– SkillYoga from Germany

– Fan Games Arena from the UK

– La la sports from Italy

– LiveDuel from Ireland

– Rooter from India

It is also keen to note, that RunLive Sports App Startup has Carole Beckford, well known and respected Caribbean Sports Expert, Consultant, Sports Event Producer and Author on board, as mentor and Communications Spokesperson.

We are also familiar with David Mullings who has been a sponsor and attendee at our Kingston Beta and Caribbean Beta past events.

We wish them much success!!