DUBAI: Cricket’s mandarins have never been mistaken for tech visionaries. But the International Cricket Council is taking a punt on innovation with Beyond Boundaries, a worldwide hackathon that demands every competing team include at least one woman—and promises cold, hard cash to the best all-female squad.
The challenge, powered by Ignyte, a Dubai-based start-up accelerator, runs through 2025–2026 and invites students, start-ups and scale-ups to reimagine sport in the age of artificial intelligence. Though anchored in cricket, the hackathon welcomes ideas spanning any sport. The grand finale arrives in January 2026, when the most promising teams will pitch their wares on an international stage.
Winners will pocket prize money, gain access to mentors and industry heavyweights, and—crucially—get pilot opportunities with the ICC and its partners to test their solutions in real sporting arenas. That is no small carrot for ambitious founders looking to crack a multi-billion-dollar industry.
The competition zeroes in on three areas. First, boosting visibility and engagement for women’s sports through digital platforms and AI-driven fan models. Second, crafting next-generation experiences for younger audiences with interactive, personalised tech. Third, improving athlete health, performance and inclusivity using wearables, machine learning and smart analytics.
Applications close on 19 December 2025. The ICC’s bet is simple: get more women into sports tech, and everyone wins. In a sector long dominated by blokes, that would count as boundary-breaking indeed.