The Model of Formation and Growth of Start-Ups in the Football Industry of Iraq

The formation and growth of start-ups in any field is considered as one of the opportunities for development, and this issue in sports can achieve the expected results of countries in sports; therefore, the current research was carried out with the aim of designing a model for the formation and growth of football start-ups in Iraq. The research method is the mixed type with an exploratory nature. In the qualitative part, which was carried out using Glaser approach, the statistical community was formed by experts and activists of start-ups, who were selected in a purposeful way. In this section, theoretical saturation was achieved after conducting 15 interviews. Structural equation modeling was used in the quantitative part, and the statistical community included all activists in sports start-ups in Iraq. In this section, the respondents were selected in the accessible way, and finally the data from 208 questionnaires were analyzed. The final model consists of the ecosystem for the formation and growth of start-ups (communications, organizational support, legal infrastructure, resources and culture), strategies (support, human resource management and networking) and the results (growth of sports economy and growth of football) were formed. The results show that the formation and growth of start-ups in a particular sport depends not only on the effective performance of the components related to that sport in particular, but also sports in general, the role of scientific societies or non-sports organizations in this field is undeniable.