Sportstech & Member News

Melbourne’s epicentre of live events is partnering with global ticketing provider AXS to deliver a world-class ticketing experience for year-round events outside the Australian Open (AO), making it easy for fans to access world-class sport, music and entertainment. As a global ticketing provider, AXS powers the world’s most iconic venues, including The O2 in London, Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles, and T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.

Cricket Australia has given the green light to private investment in the Big Bash Leagues, confirming the launch of the sale process for the Melbourne Renegades. Cricket Australia Tuesday confirmed it would invite bids from private owners for a 100 per cent stake in the Renegades, with new ownership in place for the 2027-28 WBBL and BBL seasons.

When you're managing a high-performance program across dozens of athletes at varying ages, scattered across the country, the margin for miscommunication is enormous. For AFL Talent Programs, the answer wasn't adding more staff or more spreadsheets, it was bringing everything into one place. Since transitioning to the new Teamworks unified mobile app, an app that combines Hub, Strength & Conditioning (S&C) and Athlete Management System (AMS) apps, the program has seen a meaningful shift in how coaches, physiotherapists, high performance staff, athletes and even athlete families work together.

Stan Kroenke’s deal to buy the Los Angeles Angels capped a summer with an unprecedented level of action in sports M&A, with more than $US 30 billion in franchises trading hands in the four biggest U.S. leagues. Since the start of June, sale agreements have been reached for the Seattle Seahawks ($US 9.6 billion), the Los Angeles Lakers ($US 12.5 billion), the Minnesota Timberwolves ($US 4.5 billion) and now the Los Angeles Angels ($US 4 billion). The Lakers sale, should it close, would be the most expensive team sports deal ever. There are a number of reasons why sports M&A appears to be accelerating. Major U.S. leagues have scarcity value, and there are tax benefits that come alongside their acquisitions. More recently, some investors—like Lakers buyer Joshua Kushner—are looking at sports as an area of the U.S. economy that might be more insulated from the pending upheaval from advances in AI. 

Smart ring maker Oura has filed for a US initial public offering (IPO).  Revenue climbed 74% to $US 1.21 billion over the first nine months of the fiscal year. Bloomberg reported that the listing could value Oura above $US 16 billion. The product is a sensor-equipped ring worn on the finger. Optical sensors read blood flow, heart rate, body temperature and movement through the night. The app then converts that into daily sleep, activity and readiness scores.

Sportz Interactive has acquired Magnifi, an AI-powered video clipping and content platform, as the sports technology company looks to expand its FanOS product stack and international presence. Sportz Interactive has been operating for more than 24 years and works with over 150 leagues, federations, broadcasters and teams globally. Magnifi's technology is designed to identify, clip and distribute sports moments in near real time, an area that has become increasingly important for broadcasters, leagues and digital platforms looking to push highlights quickly across multiple channels.

A new Australian research project is combining advanced composites, embedded electronics and surf safety innovation to develop smart surfboard fins designed to deter sharks. A new collaborative project involves the Australian Composites Manufacturing Cooperative Research Centre (ACM CRC), FCS, Gowing Bros Ltd, UNSW Sydney and the University of Wollongong. The initiative will develop smart composite surfboard fins capable of integrating shark-deterrent technologies directly into the fin structure. 

ASTN, with the support of the South Australian Department of State Development, is presenting the South Australian Sportstech Showcase at SportNXT, putting SA's sportstech sector in front of the sport, business and investment leaders gathering in Melbourne. The companies exhibiting include Cellr, CME, MyVenue and Your Brain Health.

ASTN, in collaboration with the Victorian Government Department of Jobs, Skills, Industry and Regions and Global Victoria, is presenting the Victorian Sportstech Showcase at the SportNXT Conference in Melbourne this week. 12 Victorian companies will be exhibiting, showing the breadth of what's being built within the State, including athlete performance, injury prevention, participation, streaming and more. The companies include 5stream, Cape Bionics, Control Bionics, FrogBox, HITIQ, MX3 Diagnostics, PlayHQ Sports, Rookie Me, Rosterfy, Solushin, Sports Buddy and Sports Performance Tracking.

The USTA and Kalshi announced a groundbreaking partnership, making Kalshi the first Official Prediction Market Partner of the US Open. The partnership comes amid the rapid growth of prediction market agreements across tennis and professional sports. Kalshi has millions of users, and tennis-related trading volume on the platform is up 25x YoY.

The Orlando Magic has announced that DAZN, the world’s leading sports entertainment platform, will serve as the Magic’s exclusive direct-to-consumer streaming partner for the 2026-27 season. Live games, alternative feeds, and original content through a new team-branded subscription service will launch on DAZN later in September. 

DAZN Media+ is taking sports fandom beyond the live broadcast with the launch of Club Kayo, a new creator-powered sports media ecosystem designed to put creators, communities and brands at the heart of Australia’s biggest sporting conversations. The ecosystem kicks off with four dedicated creator teams: Club Kayo Cricket, Club Kayo AFL, Club Kayo NRL and Club Kayo Motorsport. The dedicated creator squads will react to the biggest moments as they happen, sitting at the intersection of sport, entertainment and pop culture.

Leinster Hockey has announced a new partnership with GameDay, the sport technology platform, to advance the administration of hockey across the province for the 2026/27 season. The partnership is Leinster Hockey’s first with GameDay and will bring the association’s competitions, membership, player pathway and officials administration onto a single connected platform. It builds on GameDay’s relationship with Hockey Ireland, which began in 2021 and supports membership and competitions for the national governing body.

MOGL, an AI-powered athlete Influencer Marketing platform working with 30,000 athletes, has launched a free AI Athlete Assistant designed to help college athletes manage name, image, and likeness (NIL) deals from initial requirements through final payment. The launch comes as NIL payments are projected to reach $US 4.5 billion in the 2026-27 school year, up 60% from the previous year. The tool is built to address the administrative load NIL deals place on athletes who are also managing schoolwork, training, travel, and competition, where each deal can bring its own requirements, deadlines, approval workflows, and payment questions.

Recently launched BlackSun Private Equity, with principals from the world of politics, sports and entertainment, is launching its first fund with $US 1 billion raised so far. Ambitious projects include creating the new World American Football League, where players would own equity in teams, as well as Knockout Fights, a boxing and martial arts platform. The fund will also be looking at investments in media and entertainment, IP, fintech and commercial real estate.

Ultrahuman, an Indian startup best known for making smart rings, has raised $US 70 million in a new funding round that includes backing from Qualcomm's venture arm, as it looks beyond sleep and health tracking to build a ring that can run software on the device and eventually power everything from AI interactions to games. The round values Bengaluru-based Ultrahuman at $US 365 million. Ultrahuman is also working with Qualcomm on a new ring that will use the U.S. chipmaker's silicon.

Enhance, a Dubai-based personal training software platform for high-value, low-price (HVLP) gyms, has raised $US 18.2 million in equity and debt funding as it aims to scale in the U.S. market. Founded in 2018, Enhance provides software that’s designed to help gyms increase their personal training revenue. Globally, the company says it supports 15,000 personal trainers and over 500,000 booked PT sessions per month, while its revenue has grown at a 65% compound annual growth rate since 2019.

EverPass Media, a premier media and technology platform delivering premium live sports content to commercial businesses, has announced a multi-year commercial distribution agreement with Netflix that will bring Netflix's NFL content to commercial establishments nationwide. Through the expanded agreement, commercial venues will have access to Netflix's full NFL slate. The 2026 lineup includes the NFL's Week 1 Melbourne game, the first-ever Thanksgiving Eve game, two Christmas Day matchups, a Week 18 game and NFL Honors — the league’s annual awards show during Super Bowl week.

Global sports subscription heavyweight DAZN has signed a deal to acquire EverPass Media, the platform that delivers live sports content to commercial businesses. Through the acquisition, a platform called DAZN for Business is being launched, with EverPass to rebrand under that name once the tie-up is completed. The list of major EverPass shareholders – including RedBird Capital Partners, TKO, and 32 Equity – will now become DAZN shareholders.

InBudget’s intelligent event management platform supported Glasgow 2026 in redefining how major events are planned and delivered, helping to ensure greater efficiency and fiscal responsibility. The software platform supported the Glasgow 2026 Organising Company by integrating budgeting and reporting, procurement and contract management, project management, and risk and issue management in a single system designed specifically for the unique challenges faced by major event organisers. 

InBudget will support financial planning and reporting for the Invictus Games Birmingham 2027 as the Official Cost Planning and Budgeting Software Provider, helping to deliver the eighth edition of the Games at the NEC Birmingham and Sandwell Aquatic Centre from 10 to 17 July 2027. The software platform integrates budgeting and reporting, procurement and contract management, project management, and risk and issue management in a single system designed specifically for the unique challenges faced by major event organisers.

As part of Major League Soccer's (MLS) commitment to investing in new ways to deepen connections with supporters and turn growing interest into lasting fandom, it has engaged ECAL in a long-term partnership to deliver its official digital calendar solution for the League and MLS clubs. This includes smart, dynamic league schedules, club schedules, and single match alerts, with direct access to important broadcast and streaming details, ticketing, promos, major milestones and more – synced directly into the fans’ personal digital calendar of choice, for free. This builds on ECAL’s success across the league with clubs including LAFC, InterMiami CF, Austin FC, Portland Timbers and San Diego FC.

Rugby Australia has announce a multi-year extension of its partnership with Australian-owned high-performance hardware and accessory leader, PTP - continuing their support as the Official Fitness Accessory Supplier through to the end of 2027. The extension ensures that the Wallabies, Wallaroos, and Australian Men’s and Women’s Sevens teams will continue to be powered by PTP’s elite strength, core, mobility and recovery equipment across a vital upcoming cycle of international competition.

SAFE by Sports Buddy and OneSide Australia have announced a new referral partnership designed to help community sporting organisations strengthen how safeguarding is understood, implemented and managed in practice. OneSide helps sporting organisations understand their current safeguarding environment through Child Safety Gap Assessments, identifying strengths, risks and practical priorities for improvement. SAFE by Sports Buddy provides the digital infrastructure to operationalise safeguarding and complaints management. Both businesses are proudly Melbourne-based, with strong connections across community AFL, while remaining sport-agnostic and supporting sporting organisations nationally.

Sportradar, a leading global sports technology company creating immersive experiences for sports fans and bettors, and Euroleague Basketball have announced a multi-year extension of their data and audiovisual (AV) betting rights agreement. The rights were originally secured as part of Sportradar’s acquisition of IMG ARENA in 2025. The agreement renewal begins with the upcoming 2026-27 season and extends Sportradar’s exclusive global distribution of Euroleague Basketball official data and AV betting rights through 2031. The deal covers more than 650 games annually across EuroLeague and BKT EuroCup competitions. SportRadar's other basketball partners include NBA, WNBA, NBL Australia, NBB Brazil, CBA China, LNB France, GBL Greece, LBA Italy, and ACB Spain.

ASTN will be hosting a webinar titled "Ready-Set-Go Deploying AI Responsibly in Sport" on Wednesday 16th September at 4-5pm (AEST). Founder and CEO of Rolls Performance Lab, Shaun Rolls' will be joined by Stuart Morgan, Head of ML & AI at Champion Data, to explore what practical AI adoption looks like in sport, including secure private cloud and sandbox testing environments, deterministic AI to reduce hallucination risk in LLMs, protecting organisational IP and sensitive data and moving from AI experimentation to real-world implementation. 

Applications are now open for the Burnley FC Innovation Hub's second year, a six-month accelerator where selected startups pilot their products directly inside the club's Premier League operations. This year's focus areas are AI, sustainability and women's health and performance, a shift from year one's split between football performance and fan experience tools. The inaugural cohort placed Camb.ai, Mantis XR and Piing into live pilots with the club.

Former Sydney Olympic FC footballer Will Angel has launched Spotivo, an online platform which identifies soccer talent and can be used by athletes, coaches, clubs and academies and parents. The solution allows athletes, clubs and parents to set up a profiles, with athletes able to build a bio, with stats and highlights. In the first three weeks of its launch hundreds of players have joined, 36 clubs and academies are searching for talent, and over 35 players have been shortlisted. Will also sat down with David Weiner for a Podcast on Football360, trending with around 150,000 views. 

Minimus has introduced 'Lamington' Prototype 7, their slimmest, lightest fitness tracking eSIM HUD glasses, now with offline AI voice control. Their focus is to continue testing performance and further reduce power consumption. The business is using Australia and Taiwan as their testing environments.

PlayHQ, a global leader in competition management platforms, and American Football Australia (AFA), the national governing body for the sport, have announced a strategic partnership that will see AFA adopt PlayHQ as its single technology partner for registration, payments and competition management as the sport continues to scale across the country. With Melbourne hosting its first NFL game in September, participation is accelerating across Australia and  a single connected platform gives AFA the structure and scale to convert that momentum into sustainable grassroots growth.

Leading youth sports management platform TeamSnap, and XbotGo, a leader in AI-powered sports cameras, have announced that the companies' fully integrated live streaming experience is now available to all organizations, teams, and families on TeamSnap ONE. The integration connects XbotGo's Falcon, the standalone all-in-one AI active-tracking team-sports camera in native 4K, directly into TeamSnap ONE. Users can live stream from the same app they use to manage their season, and follow the action automatically.

The Australian Professional Leagues (APL) has extended its partnership with leading sports production company JAM TV and global media services and facilities provider Gravity Media. The three-year extension will see JAM TV and Gravity Media continue as the production partners for all Ninja A-League Women and Isuzu UTE A-League Men matches for broadcaster Network Ten and Paramount+.  JAM TV produces and delivers more than 3,000 hours of sports content for Australia’s major broadcasters and international streamers. This includes more than 500 live broadcasts each year across NBL, AFLW, State Leagues, AFL and the A-Leagues. Gravity Media is a global media services and facilities company, and delivers some of the world’s most-watched football productions, including the EPL, the FA Cup, the UEFA Champions League, and FIFA.

The global consumer wearables market is forecast to generate more than $US 1 trillion in revenues cumulatively between 2026 and 2032 as consumers shift towards more capable, higher-priced devices, according to Counterpoint Research’s Global Consumer IoT Wearables Tracker 2024–2032F. Smart hearables and smartwatches will remain market leaders, backed by large user bases, emerging health tracking features and AI-driven use cases.

The Japan Australia Sports & Health Innovation Exchange (JASHIE) has announced the first event of the ASHIE 2026 Japan Delegation, the Welcome to Japan Networking Reception, taking place in Tokyo on 9 November 2026. Over the coming weeks, JASHIE will be announcing further opportunities for businesses, innovators, investors, researchers and other members of the sports and health innovation ecosystem in both Australia and Japan to connect with the JASHIE delegation during our visit to Japan in November. These will include innovation showcases, business matching and our inaugural Awaji–Australia Sports & Health Innovation Conference.

A strategic supply partnership between precision compression garment manufacturer Cape Bionics and wearable intelligence company Melbourne Bionics has been announced. Through the partnership, Cape brings their custom manufacturing expertise to Melbourne Bionics' injury prediction platform, ensuring garments perform to the same standard as the technology inside it.

Rapiscan®, a global leader in security inspection and integrated security hardware and software solutions, and a division of OSI Systems, Inc. has announced it has been named the Official Provider of Physical Screening and Security Technology Hardware/Software Solutions of the LA28 Olympic and Paralympic Games and an Official Supporter of Team USA. o Rapiscan will support one of the largest and most complex sporting events in the world through advanced security technology hardware and software, integrated security platforms, and physical security operational expertise. 

Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, has announced a strategic partnership with ScorePlay, an AI-powered media infrastructure company, bringing together industry-leading live ingest with best-in-class sports media management. Already supporting some of the world’s premier international sporting events, professional leagues, and major broadcasters, the combined Telestream and ScorePlay workflow makes every captured moment immediately available, enabling rights holders to engage audiences, activate sponsors, and maximize the value of every sporting moment.

HITIQ Limited (HITIQ or the Company) (ASX: HIQ) is pleased to announce the execution of a Letter of Intent with the University of Southern Mississippi Sport and Tactical Athlete Research Lab (USM STAR) and the University of Mississippi National Center for Tactical Readiness (UM NCTR), alongside the appointment of Aaron Bell, formerly a full-time Lieutenant Colonel in the Australian Army, as
Strategic Military Advisor.  The Letter of Intent establishes a framework for collaboration between HITIQ, USM STAR and UM NCTR, with an initial focus on measuring head impact exposure and head-neck kinematics in military and tactical training environments using HITIQ’s PROTEQT D-MAX and PROTEQT iMG technologies.

Monday to Friday, people are sharing the content,” says Rob Knee, chief executive of the cricket livestreaming company FrogBox. The story and accompanying footage of Brian Devine’s apparent finger-clicking chicanery at Saltburn Cricket Club went around the world last week. Saltburn are one of 1,850 clubs, mainly in the UK and Australia, who have bought a livestreaming kit from the Australia-based company. As well as Cricket Australia, Cricket Scotland and Netherlands Cricket, FrogBox partners with the England and Wales Cricket Board. They have posted more than three million cricket clips online and their kits (around RRP £2,380 / $AUD 4,500) have sold out this year. 

VALD has announced that it has acquired US-based BridgeAthletic, a world-leading human performance platform. This follows VALD’s announcement last week of the acquisition of GymAware. The transactions represent a landmark moment in the evolution of performance technology, bringing together objective measurement, real-time training data and program design into a single connected platform. Founded in 2012, BridgeAthletic has grown into one of the most widely adopted, trusted and powerful strength and conditioning software platforms in the world, supporting thousands of teams and hundreds of thousands of athletes globally.

revolutioniseSPORT has announced an industry and class-leading Safeguarding solution developed in partnership with Rely covering working with children checks, concussion management, complaint handling, suspension management and expert escalation. The solution brings together one set of tools to simplify sport, saving volunteers time and effort.

Sports digital education platform leader Playbk Sport has launched Playbk Academy. Playbk Academy is the culmination of a passion for athlete development and the strategic requirement for sport to embrace technology to scale knowledge to support their academy athletes.

ASTN member SportsLink Travel has been named Agency of the Year for second year running at the Envoyage Summit. SportsLink Travel was competing against over 450 agents within Flight Centre Travel Group's independent network. 

The AFL is bringing the joy of Aussie Rules to young audiences in a whole new way with the launch of Wagtales, an animated children’s series that celebrates the fun, friendship and values at the heart of footy.  Bringing the AFL’s first children’s entertainment concept to life, Wagtales has been co-produced by AFL Studios in collaboration with WSC Sports, a global leader in sports technology and developed alongside AFL Schools educators and experienced children’s writers.  

The Gold Coast has strengthened its position as the home of Australian triathlon, with AusTriathlon and the City of Gold Coast officially opening a new High Performance Hub that will support the nation's Olympic and Paralympic aspirations ahead of LA 2028 and Brisbane 2032. The opening marks an important milestone in the growing partnership between AusTriathlon and the City of Gold Coast, following the establishment of AusTriathlon's national headquarters in the region and a shared commitment to supporting high-performance sport, athlete development and community participation.

In August, LALIGA will become the world’s first national professional football competition to roll out ‘Connected Ball’ technology on a large scale, deploying it across all LALIGA EA SPORTS matches, integrated alongside VAR and SAOT technologies. The introduction of the Connected Ball will also enable the creation of xBALL, LALIGA’s new official data layer, which will serve as the foundation for future innovations in broadcasting, digital technology and match analysis. At the heart of the system is a radio-frequency sensor developed by KINEXON and integrated into the official PUMA match ball.

Wearable devices ranging from smartwatches to home monitoring technologies will be able to connect to Australia’s national digital health infrastructure under new regulations expected to come into force by February next year. The regulations would enable healthcare identifiers to be linked to wearable and biometric devices for the first time. 

VueMotion now integrates with leading Athlete Management Systems, starting with Teamworks / Smartabase. The VueMotion and Teamworks / Smartabase integration connects athlete profiles, testing activities and results across both platforms, so movement intelligence lands inside established operating environment automatically.

5stream's Cloudmix platform has been involved in delivering AF's recent Ultimate Footy Watchalong. Behind the schemes Cloudmix was involved in taking the live OB feed, compositing the picture in picture with the Dan Does Footy studio, and keeping everything synchronised across YouTube, 7plus and Kayo - all in the cloud, in real time. By combining the broadcast vision of two live AFL matches (Fremantle v Sydney and North Melbourne v Melbourne), creator authenticity via the team at Dan Does Footy and broadcaster scale and promotion, we created a new way for fans to experience the game and reached younger audiences at meaningful scale. The Watchalongs hit 250,000+ live viewers and 10 million-plus social video views across two games. 

CoachMate Learn (LMS) has officially launched, with Cricket Australia becoming the first national sporting organisation to deliver its coach development framework on the new platform. The launch of Cricket Australia's Coach360 marks a shift in how sport approaches coach development, moving beyond course completion and compliance to recognise the many ways coaches actually learn.