New ideas, smart solutions and partnerships: Idan Sports Innovation Day 2017

Around 500 sports innovators gathered in Copenhagen for Idan Sports Innovation Day 2017 hosted by the Danish Institute for Sports Studies (Idan) on 9 October.

The event combined networking, matchmaking, pitches, booths, new technology, and a creative area. The many delegates covered a wide range of sectors and turned up to get insights and inspiration about the future of sport.

The Idan Sports Innovation Day was the first of its kind to take place in Denmark and representatives from both national and international organisations, businesses and other stakeholders with an interest in developing sport turned up to hear from both experienced actors on the innovation field as well as brand new start-ups.

Henrik H. Brandt, Director of the Danish Institute for Sports Studies was pleased to see such a big turn-up from so many sectors. In his welcome speech, he stressed that breaking down conventional barriers and borders between sport, science, technology and business is necessary to stimulate new ideas and partnerships around innovation in sport.

During the course of the daylong event, delegates could experience 20 ‘traditional’ presentations, 3 key-note speakers, 40 exhibition booths and close to 30 different ‘pitch-presentations’ from start-ups, businesses and organisations sharing the selling points of their respective products or ideas to the many conference attendees.

The innovation day took place in GAME Streetmekka in Copenhagen that normally houses street sports activities.

See photos from Idan Sports Innovation Day 2017

Interviews with conference delegates and partners
In a series of interviews made during the day, you will find various takes on innovation in sports.

See why the Danish Handball Federation thinks that innovation is important within a traditional sport as handball.

Clustering is an essential part to strengthen sports innovation, says René Wijlens from the Dutch Sports and Technology in this interview.

Innovation is not only about technology, says Søs Bondo from GAME in this interview and points to active lifestyle, new types of communities as other areas that can benefit from innovative approaches.

Cross-national cooperation is key when working with innovation, says Victor Beerkens from sports accelerator Sports eXperience in this interview.

See technical engineer Andreas Top Adler from elite sports organisation Team Denmark show an example of how technical innovation can help improve the performances of elite athletes.

Learn how London Sport uses innovation on the way to the goal of making London the 'most active city in the world‘ in this interview with Chris Scott, Head of Corporate Communications at London Sport.

Hear from Klaus Frejo from conference partner Steen&Frejo why it was important to be a part of Idan Sports Innovation Day. 

See Christian Birk from Roster Athletics explain how he works with sports innovation, how he sees the future of sports innovation and about the difference between developing innovative solutions for consumers and businesses.    

In this interview, Project Manager Annette Rye Larsen from MedTech Innovation talks about the networking opportunities during the Idan Innovation Day and about why sports technology is important to the innovation network that MedTech runs.