USC Marshall Alum’s Startup Making its Mark in International Basketball
Brandon Smith, an alum of the USC Marshall School of Business, has changed the way international basketball teams recruit and train. His company, Global Sports Analytics (GSA), offers a proprietary, web-based software that provides different types of analytics and data to teams that compete within the international basketball community.
For players, the GSA developed a sports agency that leverages the software’s algorithm to help guarantee better contracts for clients. He recently shared his success story to his alma mater in an article published by the school.
“We use advanced metrics to help build rosters for European teams,” Smith told USC Marshall. “Basically, we identified a hole in the ecosystem, and we’re bridging the gap—matching up teams and players—so that everyone can thrive.”
Starting up GSA has taken Smith across Europe, but his journey began at Marshall. Smith gives a lot of credit to the USC faculty for helping shape his entrepreneurial mind.
“There were so many people at Marshall who influenced me,” he recalls. “David Carter and Courtney Brunious at the Sports Business Institute were instrumental in my thinking about how GSA could work. [Entrepreneurship and Viterbi professor] Andrea Belz was my mentor—we talked every week. And, of course, everyone at the Greif Center was amazing.”
“Marshall was the perfect mix: a school that lives and breathes entrepreneurship, housed within a university with a big-time athletics program,” he added.
According to the company’s projections, GSA has provided services to 11 European teams in 2017 and is on track to do so for 31 teams in 2018. What’s next for the startup? Smith says GSA has secured funding through the second quarter of 2018, and believes his company is poised for positive growth in the New Year.
“Basketball’s popularity is exploding internationally, and we’re excited to enter markets in the Middle East and South America,” he said. “Ultimately, our goal is to strengthen the global basketball community—contributing to better team play and connecting fans through a common language that can bring people together no matter where they live.”
