Michael Jordan, Sportradar founder and chief executive Carsten Koerl, and DraftKings co-founder and chief executive Jason Robins will share the opening keynote at SBC Summit 2026 in Lisbon on 29 September. Organiser SBC has billed the session as one of the highest-profile keynotes it has staged in Europe.
The keynote, titled “Leadership in Sports Business”, runs on the opening day of the conference and will be hosted by broadcaster Kirsty Gallacher, a former Sky Sports News presenter. It pairs a basketball figure with the heads of a sports data supplier and a US sportsbook operator, three careers that sit at different points of the sports and betting value chain.
What the session will cover
SBC says the discussion will look at how sports, technology, media, data and fan engagement have changed, drawing on the three speakers’ work across professional sport, sports data and online betting. It will also examine the relationship between sports betting and iGaming, and how the two increasingly operate alongside each other. Wider themes include building global businesses, leadership under pressure and managing change in fast-moving sports and technology markets.
The line-up reflects that convergence. Koerl built Sportradar into one of the largest suppliers of sports data and integrity services to bookmakers and leagues. Robins co-founded DraftKings in 2012 as a daily fantasy operator and turned it into one of the biggest online sportsbook and iGaming brands in the United States after the 2018 repeal of PASPA opened state-by-state betting. Both Sportradar and DraftKings are now listed on the Nasdaq. Jordan brings a profile that reaches beyond the sector, alongside his own commercial and ownership interests in professional sport, including a longstanding stake in an NBA franchise.
“This is the kind of conversation that transcends our industry. To have Michael Jordan, Carsten Koerl, and Jason Robins on stage together is something truly special,” SBC chief executive and founder Rasmus Sojmark said.
“These are individuals who have each changed the way people engage with sports and business in completely different ways, through performance, technology, innovation, and vision. Bringing them together at SBC Summit reflects both the scale of where this industry is today and where it is heading.”
A bigger Lisbon edition
SBC Summit 2026 takes place at the Feira Internacional de Lisboa from 29 September to 1 October. Organisers expect more than 40,000 attendees from the sports, betting, gaming, payments, marketing, affiliation, technology and media sectors, which would extend the growth the event has posted since moving to the Portuguese capital. The conference relocated to Lisbon in 2024 after earlier editions in Barcelona, and has raised its attendance target with each year in the city.
The choice of host city tracks a market that has kept expanding. Portugal’s online gambling sector reported €1.21 billion in gross gaming revenue in 2025, giving the conference a growing regulated market on its doorstep and a base of operators, suppliers and affiliates within travelling distance across Southern Europe.
The keynote is one part of a wider agenda. SBC has separately confirmed a dedicated betting track covering sportsbook technology and artificial intelligence, and its First Pitch start-up competition on 1 October. The event competes for calendar space with G2E in Las Vegas, which runs 28 September to 1 October, and SiGMA North America earlier that month.
What happens next
SBC says further detail on the keynote, including timing and attendee access, will follow in the coming months. With the speaker list set nine months out, the session gives the organiser an early marketing anchor for a Lisbon edition that is again targeting record attendance, and a public test of how far the lines between sport, media, data and betting have blurred.
Source: SBC
