Investor pitch
PLAYGRND
Football became a global product. It is time to give it back to the people.
PLAYGRND starts where football is still played for the love of it: on local pitches, among people whose results, rivalries and stories are rarely preserved.
Start local. Build for a wider market.02 / Beachhead market
Croatia is small enough to prove the model and football-rich enough to matter.
The official system already shows a large base. Private leagues, summer tournaments and recreational football add a layer with no single registry, so public facts and planning estimates stay separate.
Local proof
1,500-2,500 teams, 25-50 thousand profiles and proof that players follow, return and activate the next competition.
Repeatable model
15-25 thousand teams and 300-500 thousand players through local partners, languages and organizers.
Network product
150-250 thousand teams and 3-5 million players connected by the same identity, record and marketplace.
Sources: HNS and Semafor (2026), EMF Croatia. Team, event and phase ranges are PLAYGRND planning assumptions to validate through pilots.
03 / Opportunity
Professional football has everything. Local football still has WhatsApp and paper.
Professional football has identity, statistics, video, media, sponsors and a market. The local game, where most people actually play and belong, still depends on messages, spreadsheets and content that disappears within 24 hours.
A player without a career record
An amateur player has no lasting career record across teams, leagues and years.
Too much manual work
The most valuable data depends on people already carrying too much operational work.
The audience restarts every season
Without lasting profiles and history, every new season must win back the same players, teams and followers.
04 / Proof and risk
The product exists. The active community still has to be proven.
We imported real seasons, connected matches to players and teams, and published the product. We do not present historical imports as retention: this round must prove that players return and that one competition brings the next.
6,228played matches onlineproduct proof
5,757players in the public recordreal records
52league and tournament editions40 league + 12 tournament
4organizer pilotsSun City, Brda, Liga Bez Briga + Hvar agreed
The first €300k proves user behavior
We measure profile claims, follows, post-match return, sharing and organizer-to-organizer referrals.
Faster input must reduce expansion cost
We measure input time, correction rate and competition onboarding cost, not the number of new features.
05 / Product
Public profiles for players. A working tool for organizers.
Players already get a lasting public history. The goal is to connect them with people, teams and competitions worth following while giving organizers a simple route in without upfront cost.
A lasting player profile
One profile connects a career, statistics, honours, teams and content across years.
Context generic apps do not have
A planned match-report layer builds correctable, evidence-backed signals about team and player styles. An authorized manager can ask who fits the team and receive an explanation, not just a statistical ranking.
A robust core, a replaceable AI layer
AI proposes. People verify the facts.
06 / AI input
Photograph the match sheet. Get a complete match draft.
A match-sheet photo becomes a reviewable match draft. The point is not AI for its own sake, but reducing manual transcription: AI proposes, the organizer verifies, PLAYGRND preserves the trusted record.
PLAYGRND assistantWhatsApp Business
Here is the match sheet from tonight.
21:48Reading the sheet and matching players...
Match draftAI confidence 96%
REVIEWPace Raro4 : 2AGILO
- 6 goals detected
- 2 cards
- 18 players matched
Concept demo with illustrative data.
07 / How it grows
One competition brings an entire local community.
A free organizer layer removes friction. The working hypothesis is that players come for their own history, while return and sharing bring in the next community.
Founding Organizer program
The first 50 active organizers, or all who join before 25,000 activated profiles, keep the core plan free forever.
Connect the players
Profile claims, follows and corrections turn results into a real local network.
Create a return habit
The goal is for results to create feeds, records, rivalries and local stories people follow between matches and seasons.
Monetize distribution
Only after attention exists do local sponsors, booking, media, data and physical infrastructure switch on.
08 / Monetization
Community is the product. Distribution becomes the business model.
We do not charge the founding cohort for core league and tournament access. Capital funds the time needed to build an active network; revenue switches on where attention and trust create new value.
Limited founding cohort
The program closes at 50 active organizers or 25,000 activated profiles. Accepted organizers keep the core plan free forever.
Local sponsors and ads first
Direct, localized packages around leagues, matches, players, content and later streams, with PLAYGRND and the organizer sharing the value created.
Revenue grows with the community
Entry fees, venue booking, split payments and a marketplace make sense once enough active players and organizers already use the network.
Network and infrastructure
Streaming, APIs, scouting, ads and PLAYGRND venues with cameras, scoreboards and branded inventory arrive in later phases.
09 / Positioning
Adjacent products solve parts of the problem. None closes the whole loop.
PLAYGRND should not imitate a federation system or another global live-score app. Its place is between official data, daily organizer work and the life of a local football community.
COMET
Official association infrastructureDeep registration, competition, referee, discipline and payment workflows. Built for institutions and rules, not an open player-first ecosystem.
Sofascore / Torneo
Global live score + local inputMassive distribution and manual live input for local competitions. Organizer payments, booking and a lasting amateur career are not the product core.
Flashscore
Fast global resultsExcellent scores, alerts and sports content across 35+ sports. It does not run leagues or the local economy around players.
HRnogomet
Deep Croatian archiveA valuable, detailed statistical record of Croatian and ex-Yugoslav football. The archive is the product, not active competition operations, payments or community workflow.
PLAYGRND
Grassroots football + identity + planned marketplaceToday's product connects competitions and lasting profiles. Payments, booking and partners follow only after an active community is proven.
Product sources: Analyticom COMET, Sofascore Torneo, Flashscore and HRnogomet, reviewed July 2026.
10 / Roadmap
From one pitch to football that belongs to people again.
First we earn the most valuable thing: people's time and return. Revenue, infrastructure and organization come only after an active community exists behind them.
1
NowFounding 50
A limited free cohort, accurate data, profile claims, follows and the first proof of the community loop.
2
0-18 mo.Active local network
Feeds, notifications, content and report-derived community context create a return habit and recommendations that understand a local team, without pressure for early monetization.
3
After densitySponsors, booking and PLAYGRND venues
Local ads and sponsorships first; then booking, payments, cameras, scoreboards, streaming, APIs and scouting.
4
EndgameOverthrow FIFA.
A network of members, organizers and PLAYGRND venues that sets standards and returns identity, history and value to the people who play.
11 / Team
A small team today. A real six-person team tomorrow.
Founder-built development tools accelerate research, engineering, documentation and operations, but they do not replace people. The round builds a team for product judgement, field work, community, content and partnerships.
Hrvoje Pavlinović / Founder
A lifelong football enthusiast. A serious knee injury at 14 and a lack of professional support took him away from competitive football, but never from the game. He is a former player and board member of NK Prugovo, contributing to its youth setup, women's football and local community. He built the club's digital platform and has carried the PLAYGRND idea since 2015. He specializes in agentic systems and trustworthy context infrastructure, experience he uses to keep PLAYGRND's core fast, reliable and independent of any single AI model. He publishes the research through HILLS Lab.
- Ericsson, Rimac and Profico
- ReneVerse: 1.7B+ monthly ad impressions
- TILT: live commerce and ruthless execution
- Agentic engineering and accountable context
- Husband and father of two daughters
Product and engineering
The founder plus two people across backend, data, AI, full-stack product and reliable delivery.
Leagues and field operations
One person for organizer onboarding, support, renewals and understanding the work beside the pitch.
Community, partnerships and content
Two people across player activation and retention, local partners, sponsors, content and distribution.
People before titles
The team is built from trusted local people for specific work. Advisors and public names join only when there is a real role.
12 / Investment proposal
The first €300k proves the model. The full round scales what works.
The target remains €1m through a strategic group, but capital is tied to evidence. The first close funds proof of user behavior and repeatable distribution; the rest of the round scales the model once those signals are real.
Product and community team
Six people across engineering, data/AI, UX, activation, content and reliable delivery.
Founding 50 and field work
Standardized organizer onboarding, local activations and proof of the community loop across several cities.
Sponsors and partnerships
Initial local packages, reach measurement and relationships with venues, brands and the football network.
Reserve
Infrastructure, privacy, legal groundwork and room for seasonal cycles and learning from real behavior.
13 / Invitation
We are not looking for one investor. We are building the right group.
The target is €1m, with a €300k first close and individual tickets from €50k to €250k. The first close proves user behavior and distribution; the rest of the round scales the validated model. The group adds access to football, sponsors, media and regional reach.
This is a working discussion proposal, not a legal offer. Final terms require legal, tax and financial review.