As a football player, David Carter sealed the edges of the line of scrimmage to give his teammates an advantage. Since that time, he has traded in the football gridiron for the “rough air” of entrepreneurship.
Carter launched Digital Edge Sports Inc. in the summer of 2011. Based in Athens, the company uses digital technology to link sports organizations to fans. The forward-looking focus led to the company’s inception.
Before founding Digital Edge Sports, Carter worked with the National Football League’s New England Patriots, the PGA Tour’s Memorial Tournament and Ohio Athletics. After working at the professional and collegiate levels, Carter decided to move in a new direction.
“The next frontier of the sports industry is certainly the youth and high-school segment,” Carter said. “That combination led to the company.”
Last week, he began a four-week project with Ohio University’s College of Business. The project aims to give students in the business cluster the chance to gain real-world experience and to use creativity to market the company to other cities.
Carter graduated from Ohio in 2008 with a degree in business administration. He then enrolled in the business and science administration master’s program, where he became fascinated with the expanding world of sports technology as well as sponsorships.
Before his time at Ohio, he played defensive end at Vanderbilt for two seasons. He transferred to Ohio University to have a chance to play offense and wound up as a tight end for the Bobcats after sitting out a season to comply with NCAA transfer regulations.
The next year, Carter helped to open running lanes for the program’s best running back, Kalvin McRae. McRae is Ohio’s all-time leader in rushing yards with 4,398 and most rushing yards within a season with 1,434. He holds the record for the most rushing touchdowns in a season with 19.
“As someone who blocked for him, he tended to help you out,” Carter joked. “If you missed a guy, you know he might break a tackle or two and make you not look as bad.”
Carter’s best game as a Bobcat was against Kent State in September 2007, when he had five catches for 99 yards. He scored five touchdowns as a Bobcat.
Being a student-athlete in the business cluster is not an enviable task. Professor John Kiger, who headed Carter’s project and is a marketing professor at Ohio University, said it is hard to take the cluster with
athletic schedules.
“It’s brutal. The athletes have learned to pick when they can and when they can’t take the cluster,” Kiger said. “Generally, they sign up in the offseason, but they have other commitments. They have weight-lifting commitments … but David pulled it off just fine.”
For Carter, the decision to base the company in Athens made sense because of the connections he made during his time as a student.
He will continue growing the bonds he formed by sponsoring a graduate assistant in the sports administration program because student resources are a valuable asset to his company.
“This is a priority of my company, not only giving back and giving opportunities to students but we get a lot out of it, whether it’s the graduate program in the sports administration program or the college of business in my time there,” Carter said. “But we are going to continue to do that. That’s going to be a tremendous asset down the road as we grow.”
Carter resides in Athens with his wife Erin, who also serves on the board of advisers for Digital Edge Sports.
nr225008@ohiou.edu
