KhiladiPro, a rising force in India’s sports tech ecosystem, has raised $1 million in pre-seed funding to power its mission of identifying, nurturing, and launching the country’s grassroots athletic talent. The round was led by Shastra VC and MGA Ventures, with participation from notable angels including M Pallonji, Jeena and Co., Ayaz Billawala, Nimesh Kampani, and Jaimin Bhat.

Founded by Utkarsh Yadav, KhiladiPro is on a bold mission to democratize access to professional sports for aspiring athletes in India. Their platform connects young talent with coaches, scouts, training resources, competitions, and performance analytics - all through a single digital hub.

In a country where cricket dominates headlines but millions of talented youth remain underserved across other sports, KhiladiPro is stepping in as the infrastructure layer for the next generation of Indian athletes.

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The Opportunity: Where Raw Talent Meets Real Data

KhiladiPro is more than a talent discovery engine - it’s an athlete operating system. The platform helps athletes showcase their performance data, track progress, receive personalized feedback, and connect with coaches, scouts, and sponsors.

Core features include:

• Performance tracking and analytics for individual athletes
  
• AI-powered recommendations for training and competition
  
• A leaderboard system that ranks talent across sports, geographies, and age groups
  
• Verified profiles to build digital athletic resumes
  
• Challenges and competitions hosted both virtually and on-ground
  

By building this athlete-centered ecosystem, KhiladiPro is unlocking a digitally-enabled path to visibility, especially for those outside metro areas and elite academies. As more Indian athletes gain international attention, the need for structured talent development has never been greater.

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A Market Ripe for Disruption

India has long been a sleeping giant in global sports, but the tides are changing:

• The Indian sports industry (excluding cricket) is expected to grow to $13.5 billion by 2027, driven by rising viewership, brand sponsorships, and grassroots initiatives (KPMG).
  
• Over 400 million young Indians fall into the key demographic for sports participation, and more than 60% of this group express interest in competitive athletic development (FICCI-EY).
  
• Government programs like Khelo India and private leagues in football, kabaddi, wrestling, and athletics are fueling demand for talent pipelines.
  
• However, access remains uneven - 85% of talented athletes lack exposure to structured training, scouting, or digital performance records.
  

But it’s not just about who’s on the podium. It’s about building the pipeline that gets them there.

KhiladiPro isn’t selling dreams - it’s mapping the journey, starting from school-level discovery to high-performance pathways. What makes their approach powerful is their understanding of the athlete as a digital profile, not just a stat line. Each user builds a portfolio - skills, performance data, coach feedback, and training benchmarks. That’s not just data. That’s currency.

And this is the part most founders building in fragmented or underdeveloped ecosystems get wrong.

They rush to monetize the tip of the pyramid - elite users, top-tier institutions, or a handful of polished success stories. But KhiladiPro went the other way. They’re digitizing the base. Instead of waiting for the next Olympic medalist to show up, they’re creating the infrastructure that lets the next 10,000 medalists be found.

That’s the ultra insight here: own the infrastructure, not just the interface.

If you’re building in an industry where the players are offline, scattered, or informal - like sports, education, or healthcare - the biggest long-term moat isn’t flashy UX or celebrity partnerships. It’s trust. And trust is built by being the system of record - the place where users go to prove they exist.

KhiladiPro didn’t start by asking, “How do we make sports cooler?” They asked, “How do we make sports visible for everyone who’s being ignored?”

For founders building in overlooked markets, that’s the unlock. Visibility isn’t a feature. It’s a mission. And when you give people the tools to be seen, they’ll build your platform for you.

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The Founding Vision

Founder Utkarsh Yadav, a former athlete turned product leader, launched KhiladiPro out of personal frustration with the systemic lack of structure and visibility for non-cricket athletes in India. He built the platform to solve the exact problem he once faced: “Where does a kid from a Tier-2 city go to get discovered without connections?”

His vision is simple but ambitious: make talent the only requirement to go pro.

Under his leadership, KhiladiPro has already:

• Onboarded over 25,000 athletes across multiple states
  
• Partnered with 100+ coaches and academies
  
• Launched performance analytics pilots in schools and district competitions
  
• Run national challenges in disciplines like athletics, football, and kabaddi
  

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The Sports Tech Boom in India: Timing Couldn’t Be Better

KhiladiPro is entering a sector that is ripe for disruption - grassroots sports development, a space historically underfunded but now getting national attention.

• According to EY-FICCI's 2023 Indian Sports Report, the non-cricket sports market in India grew at 11% year-over-year, with viewership, league creation, and digital adoption all surging.
  
• The Khelo India initiative by the Government of India has led to the identification of over 2,600 talented athletes across disciplines, but over 80% of India’s aspiring athletes still remain outside formal scouting networks (Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports).
  
• The sports tech market in India is projected to hit $3.4 billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 14.5%, driven by platforms focused on talent development, performance analytics, fan engagement, and AI-enabled coaching tools (ResearchAndMarkets).
  
• Globally, youth sports technology - spanning everything from performance tracking to virtual scouting - has become a $17 billion industry, with countries like the U.S. and China setting the standard in athlete development. India is next in line.
  

And most importantly:

• India has a demographic advantage - with over 600 million people under the age of 25. According to Nielsen Sports, 67% of Gen Z youth actively engage in sports at a school or district level.
  

This massive base is eager for structure, technology, and pathways to professional opportunities. Yet, there’s still a data vacuum - a lack of centralized records, digital resumes, or measurable KPIs for these athletes.

That’s the hole KhiladiPro is filling.

Their timing is perfect: India is not just investing in medals - it’s investing in method. As digital transformation touches everything from government education to Olympic training camps, KhiladiPro could become the gold standard for athlete data infrastructure in India.

In the next 5–7 years, expect to see Indian sports evolve not just with more athletes - but with smarter systems. And KhiladiPro aims to be the platform powering that shift.

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What’s Next for KhiladiPro?

With this funding, KhiladiPro plans to:

• Expand its tech stack with AI-based training recommendations and injury prediction tools
  
• Launch state-level leaderboard systems and city-wise competitive challenges
  
• Grow its network of verified coaches and scouts
  
• Integrate sports scholarship and sponsorship pathways for top-ranking users
  
• Introduce a premium subscription tier for academies, schools, and training centers
  

Their larger goal is to become the default identity layer for athletes across India - not just in Tier-1 metros, but in every village, school, and town where ambition runs faster than opportunity.In a nation with 1.4 billion people and Olympic ambitions, KhiladiPro is not just building an app. They’re building a generation of champions.