Student Co-founds Social Sports App

 

Interview with Joshua Glick, 2nd year graduate student in the Advertising program

Advertising Graduate student Joshua Glick has found that the empowerment that defines the Advertising Program at UT has taken him from being a student to an active entrepreneur. Josh is a student in the Texas Creative sequence, and he has also dedicated his time as an AdGrad to launching a mobile app called GameUp for smartphones (and soon tablets and PCs) that allows the user to socialize and connect with their friends while watching sports. 

What made you want to come to UT Austin for the advertising masters program?

Really, I fell in love with the school. I’ve always liked Austin and when I came to visit UT, everyone was really welcoming and accommodating. I went to lunch with a few students after visiting a class and got some great insights on what it’s like to be a grad student here. Already having one degree, I wanted my second to be as meaningful as possible. Based on my experience here, there was no better place to go to grad school.

Is there a defining characteristic about this program that you’ve seen throughout your time here?

Empowerment. Since I’ve moved to Austin and after starting the program, I feel like I’ve been given every opportunity to succeed. One of the best things about our program is that you can do anything here. You can do anything after school. I came here with the goal of one day starting a company, which has already happened less than a year into the program (GameUp was conceptualized in February of this year).

Did being a student in the program enable you in anyway to seek out your entrepreneurial ambitions?

Yes. The confidence that the AdGrad program has in its students is great. The fact that anyone that joins our program is going to be a top of the line person and professional is also helpful. My peers are amazing people.

Clearly you were motivated to start your own business before you came here, but was there something about this program that helped you?

You can just do whatever you want in this program. The flexibility and the access to resources here are second to none. Why go to grad school anywhere else?

Dr. Cunningham has also been extremely helpful throughout this process. She has provided great advice from the very early stages of GameUp and we wouldn’t be where we are today without her support.

So, tell us about the development of the GameUp app.

Sports are inherently social and sports telecasts are not. So when you’re watching a game, you’re texting, tweeting and posting on Facebook to communicate with your friends. We want to consolidate all of the current social sports activity into one communal place.

I’m fascinated by the process of developing a business so creating an application in a booming app market sounded thrilling from the beginning. Our goal is to connect sports fans with their friends while they are engaged in watching sporting events, whether they are at home, at a bar, or at the stadium. Leveraging the ever-expanding mobile market made sense as we were conceptualizing this platform.

What’s your personal way to get something like this accomplished?

From the initial concept to development of the product, it’s been a complete team effort. There are three other co-founders and we have a team of great people that need to be recognized.

Our team consists of:
Co-founders

Joshua Glick – CMO and co founder
Bryce Holland -- CEO and co founder -- childhood friend, MBA Candidate on a leave of absence from Wharton, UPenn Business School
Preston Holland -- COO and co founder -- childhood friend, on a leave of absence from University of Washington School of Law
Klaus Thuerbach -- CFO and co founder -- MBA candidate at Wharton, UPenn Business School)

Team members

Erik Stark – Creative Director, UT AdGrad
Nick Myers - Social Media Coordinator, UT AdGrad
Alex Grunstein -- Social Media Coordinator, UT AdGrad
Josh Wilson -  Mobile App Developer, Engineering student at UPenn
Ed Funger – Back-end Developer, Engineering student at UPenn

How will it work for the user?  

Our first beta version of the app is now available in the iTunes App Store. The user logs in with Facebook Connect and immediately sees their friends who also use GameUp beta. This first version allows you to check-in to games, see which other friends are checked into the same games, and take and upload photos to your feed. We have a stats feed pushing live game and score updates into your feed, as well, so you can communicate with your friends and view real-time scores all from the same place. Using GPS, you can see where friends are checked-in from (which of your friends are at the stadium and which of your friends are watching on TV).

We have many more exciting features in development that will be pushed live in version 2.0. For the user, it’s important to remember that we’re a student startup and this first release is the spark before the fire.

You mentioned that this app is filling a hole in the market, talk about how it’s doing that.  

We decided to approach the second-screen market (computers, smartphones, tablets) in a novel way. One of the things we had to do from the very beginning was find out what existed in this vertical, and if our approach had already been attempted. There were a few other companies that tried executing similar ideas, which proved that a opportunity existed. We interpreted this as an opportunity to fill a need and decided to go for it.One of the most important things to keep in mind, this is social first and sports second. Smartphone mobility has created a great deal of opportunity for location/activity-based progress and that is one of the things that we are aiming to capitalize on.

Why have you chosen to stay in school while also starting a business?  

Good question, now that I think about it. Sleep has been hard to fit into my schedule over the last few months.  Maintaining relationships with the University is important, since we’re launching from Austin. GameUp is a portfolio company in the Austin Technology Incubator (ATI) and our office is located at UT’s West Braker campus, so maintaining student status has its benefits. Our advisors there have been very helpful in guiding us in the right direction.

You were talking about sports being inherently social. Is there a memory that stands out to you?

I love going to games.  I went to a Mariners game this summer while visiting Seattle, which was my first time at Safeco field in a long time. I have friends who also enjoy baseball, so I took a picture at the game and sent it to them in a text, tweeted it, posted it to Facebook. This was when GameUp beta version 1.0 was still in development and I couldn’t wait to use it during games.
 

GameUp has a promotional agreement with UT Athletics and is running a big-screen promotion this Saturday during the Kansas State game. Longhorn fans will be encouraged to download GameUp beta, take a photo at the stadium and upload it to the GameUp beta platform for the chance to win a Longhorns t-shirt and see their photo on the big screen in the 4th quarter.

Download GameUp beta from iTunes before the game here: bit.ly/GameUpApp

For all the latest updates and news, you can follow along on:
Facebook: on.fb.me/GameUp
Twitter: @GameUpSports
Website: bit.ly/txMcuA