Sachin Tendulkar folds 24-yr cricket learnings into his shoes, athleisure start-up
Almost a year after floating the SRT10 Athleisure Pvt. Cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar, along with former Swiggy executive Karthik Gurumurthy of Ltd, officially launched his sneakers and sportswear brand Ten x You on Friday.
Tendulkar is the co-founder and chief inspiration officer of Ten x You, which has launched a range of shoes designed for professional cricketers. The brand has been testing the shoes with cricket academies and semi-professional players since March this year.
Athleisure refers to clothing that has both the functionality of sportswear and the comfort of casual wear.
Ten x You aims to bring some highly technical insights from the master cricketer’s career. “I don’t want to deal with things that other brands miss out on,” Tendulkar said Mint in an interview.
“As for our brand, we have 24 years of experience in this field, and I used that. The experiences I gained over the years by playing in different conditions, on different surfaces, some normal, some softer, some dusty. [Our question was] “How can we design a shoe that will answer all of these?”
The brand first promotes its products on its direct-to-consumer (D2C) website (www.tenxyou.com) and will transition to offline sales and other channels within six months after identifying the best-performing products. In addition to shoes, the brand also sells t-shirts, trousers and other sportswear on its website.
Professional cricket shoes will sell for over $200,000 ₹9,000 and semi-professionals ₹5,500- ₹ 6,000 per couple.
cricket first
Co-founder and CEO Gurumurthy said the idea is to start with cricket and shoes and products for running, training and sports activities will be launched later. “We believe we need to win in a particular sport and clearly project in the consumer’s mind that we are a world-class performance brand,” he said. Mint in an interview. “This is our coastal strategy.”
“After we win there, we will slowly turn into people playing cricket at the recreational level,” he added.
Gurmurthy cited running shoe brands ON and New Balance as successful examples of this strategy. Tennis star Roger Federer is ON’s brand ambassador.
Tendulkar owns 54.78% of Ten x You. Brand rose ₹25 crore from venture firm Peak XV’s early-stage accelerator Surge Ventures last September.
Of course, this is his second venture in the ready-made clothing industry. In 2016, he collaborated with textile giant Arvind Brands to launch menswear brand True Blue.
Apart from clothing, Tendulkar and his family have also invested in many sports and entertainment businesses. Last month, risk management firm Kroll estimated her brand value at over $112 million, placing her fifth among India’s biggest celebrities.
take action
Tendulkar says that his aim with Ten x You is to encourage Indians to be active and states that this is his goal after retiring from cricket.
“At the grassroots level, kids should go out and play as much as possible,” he said. “This develops you as a person, your fine motor skills, reflexes and coordination. If you sit at home, these will never develop. These are the batting I want to play for India after retirement. I will continue batting for India, but in a different capacity.”
He also added that he has leveraged his extensive experience in recovering from sports injuries to collaborate with experts and create products that work for all Indians trying to be active.
“Even I didn’t know that much about insoles until 2000, when I was injured,” he said. Mint. “This kept me out of action for a while. I went to South Africa and learned the importance of relieving pressure points [across the foot]. Every person you see has different spots on different parts of their feet.”
Gurumurthy said the brand also tested the shoes with cricket academies and coaches in India and took feedback to improve the design of the shoes.
Sachin is not the first
Tendulkar’s brand is the latest in a long line of athletic entertainment ventures spearheaded by athletes and celebrities in India. In 2017, cricketer Virat Kohli, together with sports giant Puma, launched shoes under the One8 brand, named after his jersey number 18. This later expanded to include clothing, underwear and a series of health food restaurants called One8 Commune.
Earlier this year, Kohli acquired around 2% of sporting goods manufacturing company Agilitas Sports.
While fellow cricketer Mahendra Singh Dhoni also launched a sportswear brand Seven in 2016, Yuvraj Singh also ventured into the clothing industry with YWC clothing in the same year.
Actor Hrithik Roshan was among the firsts in the industry with his athletic wear line HRX, launched by e-commerce company Myntra in 2013; brand passed ₹1,000 crore revenue was generated last year, according to the advertising and marketing portal Storyboard 18.
However, not all cricketer-led clothing brands have fared well. WROGN, another Kohli-fronted brand that is currently owned by Aditya Birla Fashion’s D2C vertical TMRW, reported a 9% decline in revenue in 2024-25. ₹223 crore, while losses increased by more than 30% YoY ₹75 crore.
“There is still a lot of white space to cover in the athletic sports market,” said Prasanth Shantakumaran, partner and head of sports sector at consultancy KPMG India. Mint. “There is turmoil in the mass segment, but India does not yet have a proper, high-end brand that caters to a wide range of sports.”
While most affluent Indians prefer to buy shoes and clothing made by Nike, Adidas, Puma and the like, Indian athletic wear brands tend to focus on overall price points. ₹He said 500-1000. “We may be manufacturing products for these top international brands, but we need a home-grown Indian brand that can attract global attention,” he added.
KPMG, in a report on the sports industry in India published in September, estimated that the sports equipment and apparel manufacturing market is $6.7 billion and will grow to $10 billion by 2030.
