Sporticast: Monarch Collective to Invest $100 Million in Women’s Sports
On the latest Sporticast episode, hosts Scott Soshnick and Eben Novy-Williams speak with Kara Nortman and Jasmine Robinson, managing directors of a new sports-focused investment fund. The Monarch Collective is looking to raise $100 million to back women’s sports franchises and adjacent businesses.
Nortman and Robinson talk about the thesis behind the Monarch Collective. As professional women’s sports gain viewers and sponsors, more significant investment is starting to follow. Nortman has lived this as one of the founding members of Angel City, a NWSL newcomer that is already among the league’s most valuable clubs. She mentions rowdy crowds for women’s sports in New Zealand and England as an indication that those trends are global, not just concentrated in America.
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Robinson, who was a partner at Causeway, said the group’s capital will be directed toward the more established women’s leagues, such as the NWSL, WNBA and the Women’s Super League in England. Those groups already have traction on media rights deals, she said, which helps support the rest of the business.
The group also talks about the meaning behind the Monarch Collective name. Monarch, Nortman says, is a reference to “all the butterfly effects and the chaos theory that leads to the best things in life,” including her business partnership with Robinson. It also has a second meaning of “building a new kind of monarchy.”
Monarch’s early investors include Billie Jean King, former Netflix exec Cindy Holland, and Anne-Marie Slaughter, CEO of New America and the first woman to serve as director of policy planning for the U.S. State Department.
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