International Sportstech News

The GOAL sustainability platform, founded by Oak View Group, the Atlanta Hawks & State Farm Arena, Fenway Sports Group, and green building expert Jason F. McLennan, today announced a strategic partnership with Arctos Partners, to expand the tracking performance of the GOAL sustainability program and increase sustainable operations in venues around the country.

Legends and ASM Global today announced the signing of a definitive agreement under which Legends will acquire ASM Global to create a premium live events company dedicated to providing outstanding experiences for fans around the world. The acquisition of ASM Global’s venue management capabilities will enhance Legends’ services portfolio, positioning Legends to meet the expanding needs of sports organizations, entertainment venues, convention centers, and attractions globally while supporting its vision to deliver exceptional live experiences for fans in the digital age.

FIBA has presented its Venue Guide at the IAKS Congress in Germany to an array of the world's leading architects. The FIBA Venue Guide is overseen by the FIBA Equipment and Venue Centre, and provides technical recommendations, best practice examples and inspiration to support the build and renovation of basketball venues to ensure that they are suitable for potential future hosting of competitions.

Chiliz, a sports blockchain company, has announced 25+ projects in its SportFi ecosystem, where the worlds of sports and decentralization converge to deliver new products and experiences to fans. The Chiliz vision for SportFi is that blockchain technology has the potential to transform sports into valuable, tradable digital assets, and create a new paradigm of interaction between sports entities and their communities

Barça Innovation Hub (BIHUB), an innovative division of the iconic football club FC Barcelona, has set its sights on Asia Pacific, aiming to create a lasting impact on the sports industry across the region. BIHUB looks to collaborate with regional startups whose values align with the club’s mission. The club, whose Asia Pacific office is headquartered in Hong Kong, also plans to open a physical office in Singapore.

After successfully completing two classes, the Minnesota Twins Accelerator by Techstars today announced its third cohort. Pioneering a unique pathway in the sports landscape, this accelerator is the first of its kind in Minnesota sports and just the second to be operated and funded by a Major League Baseball club.

The Aspen Institute studied the governance models and ecosystem results in 11 peer countries, with a focus on youth sport participation rates and elite performance. The countries studied (which included Australia) vary in population, geography, culture and forms of government, but all have found success in either youth sports or elite sports, or both.

NBA teams are increasingly turning to artificial intelligence (AI) to get an extra competitive advantage. The Brooklyn Nets, Detroit Pistons, Miami Heat and Orlando Magic are among the first teams to leverage Perch, a cutting-edge AI-powered weight training platform. Developed at MIT, Perch’s technology utilizes 3D cameras and machine learning to quantify weight room performance, with the goal of enhancing player motivation, safety and on-court performance.

Nike has partnered with Dove to launch Body Confident Sport, a first-of-its-kind, scientifically proven set of coaching tools for coaching 11- to 17-year-old girls that will help build their body confidence and make them feel like sport is a place where they belong. The free open-source tool is available at bodyconfidentsport.com.

ŌURA, known for its Oura Ring, and Cronometer, a nutrition tracking app, have recently announced a collaborative feature for menstrual cycle tracking. This partnership integrates ŌURA’s Cycle Insights into the Cronometer app, aiming to provide a detailed understanding of menstrual health.

adidas has announced a new partnership with Calm, the world’s leading mental health platform with the ambition of progressing sports performance through supporting mental wellbeing. The partnership will kick off as a pilot in the UK and the US with adiClub members being able to redeem points to unlock Calm Premium services. There will also be a specially tailored set of Calm created content available to all global users, curated by adidas and aligned to supporting sports performance.

FORM, the fitness technology company pioneering real-time visual feedback to elevate athletic performance, today announces that under the current rules, World Triathlon has confirmed that FORM Smart Swim Goggles are allowed in all World Triathlon Competition formats after review from the World Triathlon Technical Committee.

Kitman Labs, the sports technology and analytics company setting the industry standard for how elite sports organisations use data, today announced a new partnership with the Premier League.  The partnership will provide all Premier League and EFL club Academies with a centralised, fully integrated "Football Intelligence Platform" designed to aggregate and mobilise player and staff data across coaching, medical, sports science, operations, player care and education. 

Loughborough University’s twenty-year partnership with global sports brand adidas was announced the winner of the 2023 Royal Academy of Engineering Bhattacharyya Award in recognition of their stellar academia–industry collaboration.

Signos, a comprehensive metabolic health platform that includes a proprietary AI-engine with a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) to provide real-time data and recommendations for healthy weight management, announced $20 million in Series B funding.

3STEP Sports, the youth sports club and event operator, has partnered with Pixellot, a provider of AI-driven sports video technology, to elevate the production of live sports events for its 185 sport operators and 1.1+ million athletes across the US. 3STEP Sports will be able to deliver over 35,000 high-quality sports events to fans, athletes, and families worldwide, tripling its previous year’s production of game film with 300+ AI-automated Pixellot cameras implemented across all leagues.

World Athletics has launched an online tool that tracks the qualification process for next year's Olympic Games in Paris. "Road to Paris 2024" can be used by athletes, media and fans and provides a real-time view of each event in the qualification period.

F45 Training, a leading global fitness community specializing in innovative, functional group workouts, in collaboration with WHOOP, the human performance company, is delivering a first-of-its-kind F45 Challenge. The Challenge allows participants to track their holistic fitness lifestyle including recovery and sleep, and correlating that to their performance both inside and outside the studio for healthier habits.

FIFA hosted its annual Quality Programme Conference and Research Symposium which acts as a gathering and information point for stakeholders in the football industry on 18 and 19 October.

The FIFA Quality Programme offered attendees the opportunity to receive updates on the programme and stay informed about the latest standards and developments in football. The Research Symposium focused on sharing the latest football-related research, aiming to enhance the sport by democratizing technology and using it to create a safer environment and make it more accessible to all.

Researchers from the Apple Heart and Movement Study share new insights into one of the fastest-growing sports around the world: pickleball. To see how this emerging sport compared against the long-standing game of tennis, and how it impacts overall health, researchers turned to the data.

Genius Sports Limited has expanded its partnership with the National Football League to power NFL+, the NFL’s video streaming subscription service, with data-driven on-screen graphic overlays and visualizations that bring the live action to life in real time. Starting this weekend, Genius Sports will provide two new customized viewing modes for every NFL+ game this season. These alternate streams will utilize the NFL’s Next Gen Stats player-tracking data to display crucial fan insights including ball-carrier speed, yards after catch, closing speed, and time to throw—all in real-time.

Zelus Analytics announced today that it has successfully completed the first tranche of its Series A. The round includes participation from Teamworthy Ventures, Gametime Capital, Kevin Durant and Rich Kleiman's 35V, Billy Beane, and others, who join existing investor RedBird Capital. Zelus Analytics is known for its advanced data and analytics platform that evaluates, predicts, and improves player and team performance. The company's world-class data science and engineering staff drives success for team partners across six sports, including baseball, basketball, hockey, football, cricket, and soccer. 

Peloton, the exercise bike company known for its streamed fitness classes, announced a new partnership with the National Basketball Association and the Women's National Basketball Association for the upcoming NBA season. Peloton users will have access to NBA-influenced classes, and those who also have a subscription to NBA League Pass will be able to stream games on the attached screen while they're working out.

Populous today announced a strategic minority investment from Providence Equity Partners, a premier private equity firm specializing in growth-oriented investments in media, communications, education and technology companies. Populous and Providence anticipate the investment will support Populous’ continued growth and allow the company to pursue opportunities to expand its service offerings and geographic presence for the benefit of clients, partners and its workforce around the globe.

Netflix has announced its first live sport event, the Netflix Cup. The competition will see F1 drivers and professional golfers from its behind-the-scenes docuseries Drive To Survive and Full Swing compete in a match play golf tournament at the Wynn Golf Club in Las Vegas, teeing off at 11pm GMT on 14 November. This is the same week as the inaugural Las Vegas Grand Prix.

The apparel giant debuted Nike Strength, a line of premium strength training equipment. Nike is all-in on fitness and wellness, with equipment joining a growing list of developments. In August, the company announced Nike Studios, planning to open its own boutique fitness studios. Now, in addition to outfitting its gyms with custom-branded equipment, Nike Strength  becomes a standalone business.

As the WNBA continues to expand and evolve, an increasing number of its franchises are harnessing the power of artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance fan experiences and cater to the rising demands of their supporters. The defending champion Aces, for instance, have partnered with ON, formerly known as GameON Technology, to leverage an AI chat system through the company’s enterprise-grade platform.

B1 SmartTV GmbH today proudly unveiled an extensive multi-year partnership between its pioneering Smart TV and Smartphone sports streaming platform, Sportworld, and Stats Perform, the global leader in sports data, content and analytics.

Sports tech startup Playermaker recently raised a growth funding round as it looks to expand the use of its shoe-mounted wearables in the U.S. ADvantage led the round and was joined by Ryan Sports Ventures, an investment vehicle founded by Patrick Ryan, whose family owns stakes in the Chicago Bears and AFC Bournemouth. Financial details of the funding have not been announced. Former Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger previously invested in the company. Since being founded in 2014, Playermaker has raised more than $50 million.

Based on remarks by its President at 141st IOC Session in Mumbai, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is exploring plans for the creation of Olympic Esports Games.

At this weekend’s Chicago Marathon, Kelvin Kiptum broke the men’s marathon record in an astonishing time of 2:00:35. The 23-year-old raced in a pair of the new Nike Dev 163 prototype shoes, which are legal under World Athletics rules. And, on Tuesday, Nike confirmed these shoes are in fact the Alphafly 3, on sale in January 2024.

World Rugby will advance the Head Injury Assessment (HIA) by introducing in-game alerts from smart mouthguard technology to show if a player has experienced a high level of acceleration which could lead to an injury.

With the fusion of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and biometric data, the realm of personalized fitness is entering a new frontier. WHOOP, a key player in performance optimization, has collaborated with OpenAI to venture into Generative AI, creating a revolutionary in-app chatbot.

Cricket fans across the world will be able to experience and engage with the game like never before through new digital activities, placing fans at the centre of the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023.

Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. and AT&T introduce the 5G Connected Football Helmet to enable and enhance communication between coaches and deaf or hearing impared student players. Previously having to rely on eye contact between the player on the field and the coach on the sideline, the technology uses augmented reality to receive communication from coaches.