From left to proper: Lauren Leichtman co-founded LLCP and at the moment serves as Co-Chairperson of the Firm’s Executive Committee. She serves because the San Diego Wave Fútbol Club National Women’s Soccer League Governor. Sabrina Leichtman-Levine is the COO on the Levine Leichtman Family Office. Geri Stengel is a contributor to Forbes and CEO and President of Ventureneer.
The Women’s Venture Summit brings collectively feminine founders, funders, and thought leaders to shut the gender hole in enterprise capital.
Women’s professional sports are now not a distinct segment—they’re an rising international market. Deloitte initiatives income to achieve $2.4 billion by 2025. Private fairness pioneer Lauren Leichtman and her daughter, Sabrina Leichtman-Levine, are among the many ladies fueling that development. I moderated a hearth chat with them on the Women’s Venture Summit in San Diego.
The Levine Leichtman Family Office made historical past with its $113 million buy of the San Diego Wave Fútbol Club, the very best valuation within the National Women’s Soccer League on the time. Their method—combining disciplined investing with long-term ardour for ladies’s sports activities—displays a bigger pattern: ladies investing in ladies’s sports activities not simply as followers or philanthropists, however as builders of worthwhile, purpose-driven companies.
From Private Equity To Owning The San Diego Wave FC
When Leichtman talks about investing, she sounds extra like a strategist than a sports owner, for good cause. She co-founded Levine Leichtman Capital Partners in 1984, one of many first woman-led non-public fairness corporations within the United States. Over the subsequent 4 a long time, she constructed LLCP into a world agency managing billions in property—and within the course of, grew to become the world’s first woman private equity billionaire.
In non-public fairness, Leichtman established her popularity by figuring out undervalued firms and serving to them obtain sustainable development. The identical philosophy guides her method to proudly owning a sports activities franchise. You need one of the best gamers, one of the best coaches, one of the best atmosphere, she commented.
Her daughter, Sabrina Leichtman-Levine, serves as chief working officer of the household workplace that manages their investments. Together, they create each enterprise self-discipline and a private sense of mission to the San Diego Wave. This isn’t an funding with an exit timeline. “We want to build something lasting—for the players, the fans, and the community,” mentioned Leichtman-Levine.
For the mom and daughter duo, proudly owning the Wave isn’t about short-term returns. It’s about constructing a franchise that may generate each financial and social worth over the long run and set up an enduring legacy.
The Business Of Women’s Sports
Market Growth And Investment Momentum
The rise of ladies’s skilled sports activities is without doubt one of the decade’s largest enterprise tales. Deloitte forecasts that girls’s sports activities income will develop from $692 million in 2022 to $2.4 billion by 2025. Soccer is main that growth. The NWSL, now in its twelfth season, continues to shatter records in attendance and viewership.
The league’s new media rights take care of CBS, ESPN, Prime Video, and Scripps Sports represents another milestone: The average annual value of those contracts elevated roughly 40-fold in comparison with earlier agreements. In an trade lengthy dominated by males’s leagues, that form of development indicators a serious shift.
Why Investors See Opportunity In Women’s Sports
For buyers, ladies’s sports activities are now not a philanthropic play—they’re a development alternative. Teams are sometimes undervalued in comparison with males’s franchises, but their viewers is increasing at a sooner fee, and brands are taking notice. Corporate sponsors have acknowledged that girls’s sports activities appeal to youthful, extra various, and extra socially engaged followers.
“Women’s sports are on the cusp of taking off,” Leichtman mentioned. She’s seeing it firsthand with the Wave.
The Wave is a component of a bigger motion in ladies’s skilled sports activities—from the Women’s National Basketball Association to the Ladies Professional Golf Association—that challenges the idea that males’s sports activities are the one worthwhile possibility.
Women Leading Sports Investment
More Women Owning Sports Teams
The pair is a part of a growing wave of women investors reshaping the sports activities possession panorama. Serena Williams and Natalie Portman have been early buyers in Angel City FC. Michele Kang grew to become the bulk proprietor of the Washington Spirit and expanded her holdings internationally with golf equipment in France and England. Tennis stars, WNBA gamers, and ladies enterprise leaders are additionally investing in ladies’s sports activities groups, signaling a historic rebalancing of energy in sports activities funding.
This surge of women-led possession has made the NWSL one of the crucial dynamic leagues in international soccer. New buyers are serving to groups modernize amenities, professionalize administration, and appeal to world-class gamers. Many of these buyers—like this mother-daughter pair—come from finance, legislation, or entrepreneurship, bringing analytical rigor to what was as soon as thought of a ardour undertaking.
“The right opportunity came along. It was a perfect way to have our first big family investment together,” mentioned Leichtman-Levine. “We’ve always loved sports.”
Changing The Narrative On Investment
Women buyers are reframing what it means to “support” ladies’s sports activities. Instead of viewing possession as a type of charity or brand-building, they’re treating it as an asset class with each social and monetary returns.
That twin motivation—revenue and objective—is attracting different ladies with capital to the sports activities trade. It’s additionally redefining who sits on the possession desk.
Leichtman’s non-public fairness background provides her a clear-eyed perspective on threat and reward. “You have to have cash flow to support your business,” she mentioned. “You can’t rely on hype. It’s about execution, community, and smart growth.”
Owning a sports activities staff, Leichtman famous, differs sharply from operating an organization. In non-public fairness, you probably have a CEO who isn’t performing, you’ll be able to exchange them. In sports activities, you’ll be able to have one of the best staff and one of the best coach, and generally issues nonetheless don’t go your manner.
Her disciplined method helps set new expectations for ladies’s sports activities possession: critical administration, strategic funding, and long-term imaginative and prescient.
Building Community And Legacy
The household partnership’s ambitions for the Wave lengthen past the scoreboard. Plans are underway for a brand new coaching and group facility in San Diego designed to serve the town’s 200,000 youth soccer gamers. “We want it to be a space for everyone,” mentioned Leichtman-Levine. It’s a spot the place women can see what’s potential—and know that girls can personal groups, too.
The new facility is a part of a broader effort to deepen the staff’s roots in the neighborhood. The Wave has rapidly grow to be a part of San Diego’s civic identification, drawing robust attendance and fan engagement since its founding in 2021.
Leichtman-Levine additionally goals to boost the staff’s visibility off the sphere by creating a way of life model that may be worn each on and off the sphere.
That method displays a rising understanding amongst ladies’s sports activities house owners that fandom is as a lot about tradition as it’s about competitors. By mixing style, group engagement, and efficiency, the Wave goals to construct a model that transcends soccer.
Owning an expert sports activities staff shouldn’t be with out its challenges. Facilities are costly. The competitors for high gamers is international in scope. While the NWSL has made vital strides, it stays within the early phases of its industrial improvement.
Leichtman understands these realities however sees extra alternative than threat. “We believe women’s soccer is still undervalued,” she mentioned. “That’s why we wanted to be part of it.”
The Future Of Women’s Sports Ownership
Women’s sports activities are rewriting the playbook for funding and influence. Owners like Leichtman and Leichtman-Levine are proving that girls investing in ladies’s sports activities isn’t simply good for equality—it’s good enterprise.
Their long-term dedication to the San Diego Wave FC displays a shift from short-term hypothesis to enduring imaginative and prescient. For mom and daughter, success can be measured not solely in championships but additionally within the alternatives created—for gamers, followers, and future feminine buyers.
As ladies’s sports activities proceed their rise, their story stands as proof that when ladies spend money on ladies, the returns go far past the steadiness sheet.