AMAZN sports showcase highlights Asian Americans

Text and Video produced by James Chung

Pranav Iyer, Founder and CEO of AMAZN HQ, sat down with AsAm News to share his story from NFL dreams to creating the premiere media company showcasing Asian American sports talent.

Born in Cupertino California, Pranav was first inspired by sports during an elementary book report. He told us “Looking through the library and ended up stumbling upon a book about Brett Favre. The recess after that book report was the first time I really actually played football.

I fell in love with football from that day and my dream in life is to play in the NFL.” 

He kept playing football through high school, landing an opportunity to play at Chapman University. While at Chapman, Pranav was the only Asian American on the team. Feeling a renewed sense of his Indian American identity he made it a point to help educate his peers and proudly represent his culture.

He pursued sports journalism while in school which first sparked his idea for creating AMAZN HQ.

“There were so many inspirational trailblazing athletes of Asian descent that came before me that I could have looked up to had I known their stories. Two, there were so many athletes my own age who were doing the same things as I was in different areas of this country that were Asian that if I had known who they were, I could have felt so much less isolation in my journey. I was like, ‘There’s something like this that needs to be started,'” Iyer stated.

He bought a camera and reached out to start filming games. Dealing with the ups and downs of the Pandemic, Pranav went to grad school and eventually got a job at ESPN. After gaining valuable experience at ESPN, he began working on AMAZN HQ full time. He and his partners created their own basketball showcase highlighting the best Asian hoopers across North American and has even partnered with the NFL, NBA, and Team USA.

While being able to cover the biggest Asian American athletes in the world, he still prides himself on telling the stories of the unsung heroes, the ones on the grassroots level making a difference. When speaking about the original content on these athletes he told us 

When other times no one else will give them that opportunity or they’re not telling the other side of their story, right? It’s not just about the numbers but it’s also about like, wow they’re doing something historic for their community.”

With his journey just getting started. Pranav had one goal for starting AMAZN HQ that still stands true “To show sports fans, non-sports fans what is possible for them in life.”