October 2025 | Athera's Odyssey | From Play to Platform

Odyssey readers,

Think about your last weekend. Chances are, it didn’t just involve brunch or a movie – perhaps you were on a turf at 6 am for a cricket match, invited to a padel court for a late-evening game, or finally tried that pickleball session your friends or colleagues won’t stop talking about. You might not consider yourself an athlete or sportsperson, but if your social life and fitness routine now include a court or a field, you’re part of India’s burgeoning and rapidly evolving urban sports movement.

To understand this cultural shift, we interviewed:

• Harsh Shah, Founder of HiFy, to explore the tech layer being built on this booming ecosystem
• Vivek Singh, Joint MD of Procam International, on the economics of mass participation events
• Suryaveersingh Bhullar, President of the Pickleball Association of India, to decode the rise of new sports

You can read the entire issue below or, if you want to go to a specific piece, click on the respective links above.

Beyond The Turf

Building the digital spine for recreational sports

If you’ve played a recreational sport in Mumbai recently, you may have seen them: small, unobtrusive cameras mounted high on the walls of a padel court or overlooking a pickleball game. Many of these are the eyes of HiFy – a startup capturing the moments fuelling India’s new urban sports culture.

“Whenever we would go to play, there would be someone who would tell their friends, ‘Hey, you know what, please take my phone and record, I’m going to bat,’” recalls Harsh Shah, HiFy’s founder. “People did it predominantly for two reasons: either they wanted to post it on Instagram, YouTube or within their WhatsApp groups, or they wanted the memory of that shot.”

This simple, almost universal impulse – to document and share one’s play – was the initial spark. It collided with another key observation. “There’s a highly engaged micro-community amongst your friends, your teams, that is always on, especially on Whatsapp,” Harsh explains. “You play on a Sunday, and on Monday, everyone is talking about the score or a shot. Tuesday, nothing happens. Wednesday onwards, chatter starts again… ‘This Sunday, we will be doing these things differently.’ This becomes a part of your weekly life.”

Marrying this persistent community engagement with the innate desire to showcase performance became part of HiFy’s core thesis, but the venture would only be viable if the underlying behaviour was more than a passing trend. Harsh, an investor in other SportsTech ventures like GoRally and Stupa Analytics, saw the macro shift.

“Post-COVID, there has been a massive explosion in how sports is perceived by the recreational player,” he states. “What used to be a casual movie date or a coffee catch-up was quickly turning into, ‘Hey guys, let’s just go and grab a game of pickleball.’”

This behavioural shift, coupled with a massive build-up of sports infrastructure – from turfs and padel courts to pickleball facilities across tier 1, 2, and 3 cities – created the perfect tailwind. “This is a generation of people who have a very different day job, and sports for them is a passion, a hobby, an activity, a social gathering, all of the above.”

The Three Faces of the Modern Player

HiFy’s early data reveals a nuanced portrait of India’s urban sports participants, segmented by age, motivation, and skill.

The first is the absolute novice. “Someone who is absolutely new to sports, who’s never played in their lives, but knows that all my friends are now hanging out there,” Harsh describes. “They hate doing exercise, but this is some way of breaking into a sweat.”

The second cohort is the returnee. “People who played some sport in their life – gully cricket or representing the school team – have completely lost touch and now this is a great excuse for them to get back.” These players actively seek out others of similar skill to ensure competitive games and are actively building friendships around the activity.

The third is the lifelong enthusiast. “These are folks who have always been playing sports, who are extremely active. They’ve played at a district or state level growing up. Sports was never a career option, but they’ve always been part of it.” They are the ones who form the core of local tournaments.

This participation cuts across age, but different sports have distinct demographics. Pickleball, for instance, sees a high concentration of 35- to 45-year-olds – professionals more established in their careers. Padel is a younger crowd, typically 20 to 40. Cricket, the perennial giant, remains democratic, spanning from 18-year-olds to 50-plus veterans holding onto their Sunday morning ritual.

The scheduling patterns are equally interesting: Padel courts are packed on weekday evenings, with a lull on Saturday nights as that demographic goes out socially. Cricket, a longer-format commitment, explodes from Friday evening through Sunday. Pickleball maintains steady traffic from morning to evening. “It’s a very interesting dynamic to see Saturday evening being a lull period for padel, but for cricket, there’s no let-up on the weekends,” Harsh notes.

Play’s Tech Stack

HiFy’s model is asset-light – they don’t own courts but partner with facility owners to install their cameras. A user scans a QR code, and the system gets to work. The camera feed is processed through HiFy’s proprietary video AI models, which identify key moments – a powerful smash, a celebration, a winning shot, even a funny blooper – and automatically compile them into consumable shorts, reels, or full match replays available for a small fee.

This seems straightforward, but the underlying technology is complex and forms HiFy’s core IP. “Video AI is still not cheap,” Harsh admits, pointing to one of his biggest cost pressures. “The video that we get, we stream it, ingest it and process it. We run models to identify key moments, players, celebrations… It allows us to pinpoint if any epic moment has happened and then hash it into a consumable highlight.” This is a frontier largely unexplored in recreational sports, where most global sports tech focuses on broadcast-level professional matches, where commentary and on-green graphics provide an easier understanding of what is happening in the game

The immediate monetisation is pay-per-view, but the roadmap points towards a richer ecosystem. “Over time, sure, there will be membership, subscription bundles, accessibility options,” Harsh says, suggesting that the deeper play is in the data. The abstraction of video into actionable insights and stats – who hit the most sixes, whose smashes were the fastest, who has the most court coverage – creates a new language for community banter and personal improvement.

The Four Value Pools of Urban Sports

Looking at the sector broadly, Harsh delineates four distinct commercial value pools emerging from this boom.

The first is infrastructure, encompassing both the physical courts and the equipment retail ecosystem, from GoRally, Padel Park, and Decathlon to specialised brands for paddles and balls.

The second is the digital layer – a category that includes booking apps like Huddle, KheloMore, Playo, scoring platforms like CricHeroes, CricClubs, and content-community plays like HiFy. This is about enhancing the experience on and off the court.

The third – perhaps unexpected – pool is recovery and nourishment. “We’re seeing a fairly large rise in sports-related injuries,” Harsh says, speaking from personal experience after a calf muscle tear. “The orthopedic said, ‘You’d be surprised with the number of sports injuries that I’m getting. These are not people who are sportsmen.’” This recreational athlete, returning to activity after years, represents a new and growing consumer for recovery, physiotherapy and sports medicine.

The fourth value pool is training and performance, which ties into the long-term aspiration of identifying and nurturing talent. “This is the one which will also be relevant for India’s quest to have more champion Olympians,” Harsh notes.

One Billion People, Ten Million Arenas

For HiFy, the ambition is global. “Our vision is that over the next 7 to 10 years, we want to engage a billion people playing sports in 10 million arenas across the world,” he states.

For India specifically, he sees a future where formal, regular sports participation becomes a cornerstone of urban life. “I want to see 300 million to 400 million people on a monthly basis playing at least one sport… I don’t think we are far away from about half a billion people playing sport at least once a month in India over the next three years.”

The obstacles to this vision are twofold, according to Harsh: the continued build-out of infrastructure beyond metro cities – which he defines as the top 15 to 20 urban centers – and rising incomes that afford people more leisure time.

The seeds, however, are sown. The shift from casual participation to a structured, community-driven lifestyle is already underway, creating a new playing field for consumers, communities, and companies. “We’re keeping a close eye on: how do you make courts more engaging, more intuitive, more fun places to play at?” says Harsh. “As the infrastructure buildup becomes more mature, you’re going to see a lot more technology coming in, understanding and experiencing the play.”

The Starting Gun

How the marathon ignited India’s participatory sports revolution

If you want to understand the transformation of India’s sporting culture, it’s hard to ignore the story of the marathon – not the elite, world-record-breaking kind, but the mass-participation kind where, on any given Sunday morning, thousands of ordinary Indians lace up their shoes and take to the streets.

As the Joint Managing Director and co-founder of Procam International, Vivek Singh has had a ringside seat for 38 years, watching sport evolve from a neglected afterthought to a front-page mainstay. “You cannot picture what 38 years ago looked like,” Singh reflects, “because today you see sport on the front pages of newspapers. You see parents telling their kids, ‘get out and play.’ Sportsmen were treated as second-class citizens. The government’s priority was nation-building, and sport was given a very, very short shrift.”

When Procam was founded in 1988, the ecosystem was barren. “There was no ecosystem,” Singh states plainly. Organising a tennis tournament meant showing wedding pandal decorators cut-out pages from magazines as a reference for what a Wimbledon-style stand should look like. “The Live Events industry today is over Rs. 10,000 to 12,000 crores. Nothing existed then.”

The turning point, or the inflection point that Singh narrows it down to, was February 15, 2004: the day of the first Mumbai Marathon. “18,000 people came out early in the morning on a Sunday to run. Never heard of before,” he says, his memory of it still vivid.

The event was a spectacle, with the Governor of Maharashtra receiving runners, Indian Naval helicopters providing a live telecast – a first in Asia – and iconic track legends like Michael Johnson and Mike Powell cheering from the sidelines. “If there is one inflection point, it’s that.”

‘Mothership’ of Participatory Sport

In the two decades since, that spark has ignited a veritable prairie fire. Running is the “fastest-growing sport in India, bar none,” according to Singh, citing staggering numbers.

“We’ve got 900 timed running events in the country,” he explains, distinguishing professionally organised races from casual park runs. “We have 1,600 total running events, a $450 million ecosystem annually, and 2.8 million people running actively.” The sponsorship market alone is worth Rs. 800 crores in cash and barter, with about 60% in cash. “You put the Indian Soccer League and the Premier Kabaddi League together, their sponsorship doesn’t match running,” he notes.

This growth is underpinned by a seismic shift in Indian society. “Our country is moving towards an experience economy,” Singh observes. “People are saying, ‘I am the star of what I want to do.’” It’s no longer just about roti, kapda, aur makaan (food, clothing, and shelter), Singh says – disposable incomes have risen, security thresholds have changed, and aspirations have expanded to include skydiving, scuba diving, and, crucially, crossing a finish line.

“People want to experience triumph, they want to experience glory. They want to experience crossing the finish line and being applauded,” he says. “You’ve got people from humble backgrounds, from affluent backgrounds, corporate CXOs, stars... from the ages of 15 to 90. You can do the same thing that the guy with a one lakh rupee Garmin watch does by just wearing a simple Rs. 5,000 shoe.”

Community & Philanthropy

One of the most potent forces unleashed by the marathon movement includes community, crystallised in the form of philanthropy, building a bridge of trust in a landscape previously defined by a “massive trust deficit,” says Singh.

“The largest sporting philanthropy platform in India is the marathon. Not cricket, not football, not Kabaddi,” Singh asserts. The figures tell a compelling story: In its first year, the Mumbai Marathon raised Rs. 41.5 lakhs for charity. Two decades later, the event has raised over Rs. 53 crores in 2025 alone, and since its inception, it has contributed Rs. 483.22 crores to numerous causes. Now, Procam is on track to raise Rs. 100 crores annually across all four of its properties for charity.

“People gave to temples, to shrines, to hospitals. Nobody wanted to give to civil society,” Singh explains. “We built that bridge of trust.” This has transformed the marathon from a mere sporting event into a powerful social platform, channeling collective energy towards causes for the blind, deaf, cancer patients, and animal welfare, says Singh.

Only The Beginning

For all of its current scale, Singh believes the running revolution is still in its early innings. The potential for growth is astronomical, poised to create a snowballing effect across the entire health and fitness ecosystem.

He points to a Redseer report indicating that 120 to 140 million Indians have a health and fitness app on their phone. “What they’re doing with it, God knows,” he quips. “2.8 million are running, and that’s created a $450 million ecosystem. What happens if 28 million people start running in this country?”

This explosion at the “top of the funnel” will fuel every ancillary stream, he adds. “The mother entity that fuels this is people lacing up and getting on that road,” Singh says. From this mothership of running, new “streams” are already emerging and will continue to multiply, he believes. Hyrox, duathlons, triathlons, and cyclothons are all offshoots gaining traction. “You will see it grow more and more. Sport is going to explode.”

Technology will be a critical enabler of this explosion, serving two primary functions, according to Singh. First, it will cater to the growing desire for performance metrics. “More and more people want to know what their performance is. They want to benchmark their performance against their own communities and against international communities,” Singh notes. Second, it will be the glue that holds these massive, distributed communities together, keeping them engaged 24/7.

“Running became the new golf 10 years ago,” Singh says, pointing to the professional networking that now happens on pre-dawn runs. “You should see the kind of professionals out there at 5 am on the streets of India.”

From a sports landscape where it was difficult to get 50 people to watch a Ranji Trophy match to one where millions vie for a spot in a big-city half-marathon, the journey has been long, but according to Singh, the starting gun has only just been fired. The real race, where India’s participatory sports ecosystem could mature into a dominant cultural and economic force, is only just beginning.

“If anybody ever tells you about ‘the good old days of sport’, they don’t know what they’re talking about. The good days of sport are now.”

The Padel & The Phenomenon

How pickleball is serving its way into India’s sporting mainstream

In the landscape of Indian sports, a new and formidable contender has emerged from the shadows of the pandemic. Pickleball, a sport once unbeknownst to most Indians, is now the fastest-growing racket sport in the country, creating communities, captivating investors, and challenging definitions of an urban pastime.

At the helm of this revolution is Suryaveersingh Bhullar, the President of the Indian Pickleball Association (IPA). An entrepreneur and filmmaker who discovered the sport like many others – during the COVID-19 lockdowns – Bhullar’s journey from novice to national federation head is a testament to the sport’s infectious appeal.

“The first day I played the sport, I think I haven’t stopped playing it ever since,” he recalls. “That’s the kind of addictive sport it is.”

His ascent was organic. “I started as a player. I never thought about getting into governance... by nature, I’m someone who’s very passion-driven. When I get into something, I’m very passionate about it.” That passion, noticed by Bhullar’s peers, led him first to the presidency of the Gujarat federation, and in April 2025, to the leadership of the IPA, now officially recognised as the National Sports Federation for pickleball in India.

Niche → Nationwide

The sport’s trajectory from a niche activity to a pan-Indian phenomenon has been remarkably swift.

“About two years ago, the sport was still prevalent only in the largest cities like Mumbai and Delhi and Ahmedabad,” he notes. “But in the last two years, we have seen the sport emerging in places like Jammu and Kashmir, the Northeast, West Bengal, Trivandrum, and Coimbatore.”

Today, the IPA has a presence in over 26 states, a growth fueled by pickleball’ unique value proposition. “It’s an easy sport to pick, difficult to master,” Singh explains. This low barrier to entry, combined with its social nature, is its greatest strength. “It’s a very family-oriented sport. I have seen families who are playing pickleball... from a seven-year-old kid to a 49-year-old father, they’re all playing.” This has transformed it from pure exercise into a weekly social ritual, a new form of family outing that is pulling youth away from screens and onto courts. “A few years ago, the youth were heavily into online gaming and not very active. But I see that the youth is now coming out, and pickleball courts are always full.”

The demographic is widening rapidly, he says. While it initially attracted an older cohort seeking a less taxing alternative to tennis, Singh now observes a significant shift. “I see a lot of younger people coming into the sport, and a lot of kids. Many people from tennis, badminton, table tennis, squash, all moving into pickleball.” This influx is being strategically channeled through initiatives like the IPA Center of Excellence in Ahmedabad, which coaches 150 players across sub-junior (ages 7-12) to 50-plus categories.

The scale is becoming significant. While registered tournament players number over 10,000, the recreational base is far larger, he says. “Ahmedabad alone has about one and a half lakh in the pickleball community,” Singh states, highlighting the vast potential for converting casual players into competitive ones. Nationally, he estimates the player count is now to the tune of lakhs, supported by an infrastructure boom of over 2,000 courts across the country.

The Business of the Ball

The economic model underpinning this growth is compelling investors and entrepreneurs, with relatively low capital expenditure, he suggests.

“You can get a court ready for three to five lakhs maximum,” Singh says. With courts charging between Rs. 800 to Rs. 1,500 per hour, the return on investment can be realised in a matter of months. “I don’t think any business is giving that kind of ROI,” he adds.

This attractive unit economics has sparked a funding rush. Startups like GoRally (Bangalore) and Dinkers Pickleball (Ahmedabad) have raised capital, with more in the pipeline. Major sports brands like Franklin and Joola are taking an aggressive interest in the Indian market, seeing it as a long-term opportunity rather than a fad. “They see a huge potential here,” Singh confirms.

Moreover, the sport’s commercial legitimacy is set to be supercharged by the upcoming official Indian league, sanctioned by the IPA and run by The Times Group. “That will eventually end up being a structured league on the lines of IPL for pickleball,” Singh reveals. This, coupled with growing viewership – evidenced by a record 7,000-strong live audience at a recent Professional Pickleball Association (PPA) tournament in Vietnam – is silencing skeptics who questioned the sport’s watchability, says Bhullar. The Times Group has even launched a dedicated channel, ‘Pickleball Now,’ broadcasting major tournaments and signaling media commitment.

Governing the Boom

With official recognition as the National Sports Federation, the IPA’s focus has shifted from mere promotion to structured governance. The challenges are those of a rapidly scaling enterprise.

“We are still trying to get a lot of investment into the federation,” Singh says, noting the lack of access to government grants thus far.

The talent pipeline also needs formalisation. “Coaching is still not very structured in India. A lot of tennis coaches are converting into pickleball coaches, which is not really good for the sport.” The IPA is launching an internationally sanctioned certification program to address this. A similar shortage exists for qualified referees, another priority for the federation.

Another significant hurdle, he says, is institutional adoption. “The other major challenge is the acceptability of the sport in schools,” Singh notes. While kids are keen, schools are often slow to grant leave for tournaments. The IPA is in advanced talks with the CBSE for formal inclusion in the curriculum and is pushing for the sport’s inclusion in the Khelo India program. “Once Khelo India accepts the sport, I think it’s going to explode,” he states.

This institutional push is being mirrored in the private sector. “Almost every new residential project coming up... is adding pickleball courts as an extra attraction,” Singh observes. Real estate developers, who once touted other sports courts as a premium amenity, are now pivoting to pickleball, seeing it as a more communal, trendy, and accessible offering.

Picking Up a Padel

When asked why pickleball will avoid the fate of other fleeting sports crazes, Singh points to India’s inherent affinity for racket sports and the game’s core design.

“India has been a largely racket sport-driven community,” he says. “It’s not a frisbee or a baseball.” The sport’s addictive nature creates a sticky user base, and its social dimension fosters powerful community networks.

The epicenter of this boom is Ahmedabad. With over 500 courts and a massive player community, the city leads the country, and Singh attributes this to a strong early federation body and the presence of top-tier talent, including the only certified coach in the country and multiple Asian champions in youth categories.

“When there are stars in a particular sport, that kind of works,” he notes, highlighting how recent international wins by players like Armaan Bhatia – who defeated the world number one – have boosted participation nationally by 2% to 3%.

The vision is ambitious. The IPA is aligned with the Global Pickleball Federation’s goal of Olympic inclusion by the 2032 Brisbane games. Domestically, Singh is unequivocal about the ambition: “I see this sport becoming the second biggest sport in India after cricket.”

From a pandemic-era diversion to a potential Olympic discipline, pickleball’s rise is a fascinating case study in how a sport can capture the Indian imagination – it leverages the nation’s racket-sport DNA, fits seamlessly into evolving urban lifestyles and real estate, and offers a compelling mix of social engagement and competitive thrill.

“This is still the top 1% of pickleball’s potential in India in terms of numbers, courts, and players,” says Bhullar. “Over the next five years, the scale will be explosive.”

Pathways

In this month’s edition of Pathways, our recommendation arc looks at travel in a counter-intuitive way. Each of these books takes you far from guidebooks and itineraries, toward journeys that unfold through people, food, history, and ideas. We’ve sequenced them from the most visual and accessible to the most expansive in scope.

The Fighting Temeraire, by J. M. W. Turner (1838). Oil on canvas, housed in the National Gallery, London

Start with the Book of Peoples of the World (by National Geographic). A sweeping yet compact introduction to humanity in all its variety, this book appeals to the sentiment of curiosity behind travel. Through photographs, maps, and concise essays, it catalogues the astonishing diversity of the world’s cultures, languages, and traditions. It need not be, and probably should not be, a one-sitting book; you can leaf through it at random, and you’ll find yourself traveling across continents in minutes.

Follow it up with Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain. Bourdain’s cult memoir remains one of the most authentic travelogues ever written, through the unique lens of kitchens rather than airports. It is chaotic, funny, and reveals the occasionally brutal world of restaurant life; taking readers into the subcultures that underpin our shared human appetite. It might seem about food, and it is, but it is also about risk, rebellion, and the restless search for meaning that often drives us to move. Raw and yet full of love.

Next, try In Xanadu by William Dalrymple. Written when Dalrymple was barely out of college, In Xanadu follows his attempt to retrace Marco Polo’s route from Jerusalem to the ruins of Kublai Khan’s summer palace. The writing is witty, vivid, and refreshingly unpolished. A young traveler’s mix of bravado, curiosity, and awe through borders forgotten in space and time.

For an added bonus, end with The Silk Roads by Peter Frankopan. This is more history than travel, though. Frankopan’s book is the map turned upside down. Told from the vantage of the East rather than the West, it’s a sweeping retelling of global history through the trade routes that connected Asia, Africa, and Europe. While more demanding than the others on this list, The Silk Roads rewards patience. Reading it feels like moving across centuries, watching ideas, empires, and cultures pass goods and gods along the same desert roads.

That’s it for this month from us. If you’re new and want the next issue of Odyssey in your inbox, subscribe above. Share this with people you know who are curious about everything at the intersection of tech, VC, and innovation in India.