The 2024 edition of the Summit took place from 18-20 September in Ghent, Belgium.
Below you'll find a brief summary about the program, speakers, and topics.
Or take a look at the aftermovie to soak up the atmosphere!
The STRN Summit focused on a variety of topics such as:
The latest scientific breakthroughs and how these could lead to actual products and services to be used in the field
Lessons learned from university-industry partnerships when it comes to innovations relevant for sports and the broader society
Needs and desires from real-life contexts such as team or individual sports, and how to set up innovation projects including the end-user early in the process
The event attracted a variety of attendees, such as:
Academics who want to explore partnerships with external stakeholders such as startups, companies, teams, federations, etc.
Research and Innovation managers looking for inspiration, talent and good practices from like-minded people and organizations
Practitioners looking forward to embracing the latest innovations early in the process
The STRN Summit also aimed to collectively define and (partly) answer some of the big questions in the sports and health domain, such as:
How to evaluate the quality of technology?
How to facilitate the transfer of knowhow from academia to society?
How to set up successful partnerships with limited resources?
This edition, we paid special attention to the crossroads between the Sports and Health tech fields, meaning:
We discussed how technology used in elite sport could benefit sport for all and healthy living conditions
How advancements in the health and medical domains might be of benefit in a sports, fitness or physical activity context (+ vice versa)
How different research, startup and funding ecosystems could be brought closer together for the benefit of sports and society
The Sports Tech Research Network is an initiative of the sports innovation consortium at Ghent University (Belgium) called Victoris, in collaboration with the non-profit organization SportaMundi.