Elevate may have jumped the gun on thinking it had closed an historic deal, that was first reported by sports business website Sportico.
The news being that Big Ten institutions Penn State and UCLA agreed to an eight-figure deals to partner with the private capital firm.
Elevate, who already has a partnership with both institutions along with Alabama, Notre Dame, and Florida, that had a partnership as part of their $500 million private capital fund as part of their College Investment Initiative (CII).
Penn State’s Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics Dr. Patrick Kraft however quickly debunked the story to Yahoo’s Ross Dellenger.
“Elevate serves as our partner in ticketing strategy and operations. To clarify, our relationship is strictly limited to these services. We have no affiliation or involvement with any private equity firm or fund,” Kraft said.
Add Nittany Sports Now as a preferred source in Google! Click here to add us.In August 2024, Penn State and Elevate created a landmark partnership to aid in the Beaver Stadium Revitalization project to “drive the strategy, sales, and service for diverse, new premium hospitality opportunities associated with these significant improvements,” according to the university.
Along with the Beaver Stadium Revitalization, Elevate will also support a ticketing experience to all ticketed Penn State athletic events.
The financial backing for the proposed $500 million as part of CII was from the private equity firm Velocity Capital Management (VCM), located in New York City. VCM is also financially involved with The X-Games, an Olympic style competition that has summer and winter competitions around BMX, skateboarding, and snowboarding to name a few.
