The San Francisco Deltas will begin playing in the North American Soccer League in 2017.

“There are no billboards of the Deltas in San Francisco,” Brian Andres Helmick, the CEO of the Deltas, told the Guardian. “There are no TV commercials. It’s been time spent at the pub, at the pickup games, at adult recreation and competitive games, at soccer nonprofits, at youth soccer – just being out there and talking to people.”

Helmick is a Colombian-born entrepreneur who has lived in San Francisco for the past 13 years.

Convinced that the NASL was a viable investment, Helmick began searching for partners in July 2015. He claims to have secured enough investors to start an NASL team by the end of August.

“I’m a startup guy, a technology guy,” Helmick said. “We’re in a city where multibillion dollar companies started in a college dorm room or a garage. And what I like about the NASL model compared to the other model [Major League Soccer] is that you spend according to where you are in your phase of development. We can focus more funds on getting the fanbase going and putting the team together – rather than spending it on a franchise space.”

With a clean slate and many of the community that the club are looking to target being tech-savvy, the Deltas say they hope to use artificial intelligence to enhance the fan and player experiences. 

On the playing side, the club intend to experiment with virtual reality. They hope VR will improve goalkeepers’ reflexes, as it allows them to simulate more saves in a shorter space of time than on the training ground. “As I have approached some of these companies, one of the main selling points is that we are so close,” Helmick said. “I’m a startup guy. I’m OK with failure. I’m OK with experimentation. I don’t mind failing and making mistakes, as long as we’re not making the same mistakes.”