Innovation Nursery’s unusual new deal with the Cornish Pirates

One of the stands at the Cornish Pirates carries a new name this season, and it belongs to a company that spends its time thinking about what athletes eat, what their kit is made from, and how a building makes a crowd feel.

Innovation Nursery, which describes itself as the innovation hideaway, has been named exclusive innovation partner of the Cornish Pirates, Penzance’s professional rugby side, for the 2026/27 season.

A collision worth backing

The thinking behind the deal is simple enough. Professional sport is a collision of people, emotion, excitement and invention, all under one roof on a match day. That, Innovation Nursery says, is the kind of room it exists to build, which is why it has backed the Pirates and got to work.

Food, materials and the building around you

Innovation Nursery works across three areas at all times: food, materials and the built environment. Rugby lives in all three. What players grow and eat shapes how they perform. The materials in a jersey and a boot decide how long they last. And the stadium itself decides what the crowd feels on a Saturday afternoon.

Put those questions to a professional rugby club and the answers stop being theory. They get tested outdoors, in the wind and the salt, in front of a live crowd, week after week.

What the founder says

John Brown, Managing Director of Innovation Nursery, said: “We’re proudly sponsoring the Cornish Pirates and becoming their exclusive innovation partner because professional sport brings a collision of people, emotion, excitement and innovation together under one roof. From what we grow and eat for better nutrition and performance, to the materials used to create kit, to the stadiums we build, this is our work playing out in front of a crowd. We’re delighted to develop a relationship with this iconic team and to reimagine with them what the future of sport might look like for generations to come. And we look forward to raising a glass to a successful season from the Innovation Nursery stand.”

What happens next

The two organisations will work together across the 2026/27 season, with plans already in motion for joint projects and content. The aim is to put the club’s players, coaches and supporters alongside the founders and scientists rethinking how we live.

Whether any of it changes what happens on the pitch is the part nobody can promise yet. The first sign of the partnership is already up, on the stand that now carries its name.

📷Alan Paver with John Brown in the newly branded Innovation Nursery stand