// startup autopsy

YouCastr

Live sports streaming startup killed by bandwidth costs and free rivals

timingSlow Death

Years-long decline before final shutdown · Fatal mistake: Launched a live sports streaming platform before broadband adoption and infrastructure costs made the business model viable.

Founded	2007
Closed	2010
Country	USA
Sector	Gaming

50%

Key Events Timeline

2007-01-01

FOUNDING

YouCastr founded to democratize live sports broadcasting for amateur events.

2008-03-01

FUNDING

Raised $0.5M in seed funding to build streaming infrastructure.

2008-09-01

PRODUCT LAUNCH

Launched live streaming platform for sports, but high bandwidth costs eroded margins from the start.

2009-06-01

PIVOT

Attempted to pivot toward monetization models but free competitors had already captured the market.

2010-06-01

SHUTDOWN

YouCastr shut down after failing to achieve sustainable revenue against free streaming alternatives.

Full Analysis

Analyst plan

Documented cause

YouCastr pioneered live sports broadcasting for amateur and semi-pro events, but faced fundamental market and operational challenges that proved insurmountable. The startup operated in an era when bandwidth cos...

ts were prohibitively expensive, making it economically unviable to stream large volumes of live sports content at scale. The company struggled with monetization, unable to generate sufficient revenue

Verified lesson

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€1.3M

Peak valuation

HypeCycle · MoatType · ResearchTags

YouCastr raised €0.5M before launched a live sports streaming platform before broadband adoption and infrastructure costs made the business model viable. ended it. See the documented cause, verified lesson and all failure signals.

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