Sports data and analytics company Catapult Sports (ASX: CAT) is set to expand its relationship with Champion Data in a three-year deal to supply the Australian Football League (AFL) with performance analytics. 

After advancing their Vector SaaS technology with applications in NFL and soccer, Catapult is now increasing its service for Australia’s most popular sport. For the first time, teams across AFL, AFLW and ALF Pathways will utilise the technology to collect data and process it into new insights for technique and strategy – it will examine player performance and also quantify decisions to help prevent injuries. 

Catapult remains the leading supplier of performance technology to Champion Data, delivering athlete tracking services to the AFL since 2015. Champion is part of the radio and television broadcasting industry where they capture all moments of a game to make the fan experience much more immersive. 

“Our continued relationship with Champion Data to partner with the AFL is testament to the incredible possibilities that are unleashed when our performance technology is used in training and on match day,” said Catapult CEO Will Lopes. 

The Company will employ its ClearSky system to be installed and used across nine AFL stadiums during live matches. ClearSky is a leg up in technology compared to its GPS counterparts, where the system uses miniature nodes attached to an athlete to triangulate and track their every move. With a positional accuracy of about 15-20cm, the produced data is considerably reliable for creating game plans, developing techniques and monitoring player performance. This is a revolution for sports as this tech is capable of being able to group athletes by the geographic position on the field and only report their movement statistics in certain areas and compare them with other areas. 

In terms of performance technology, the deepening of the relationship between Catapult and Champion Data makes it the largest league-wide deal that they have undertaken. 

This deal comes not long after Telstra and the AFL’s partnership in December 2020, where they developed the Telstra Tracker app, bringing fans closer to the game with free live player insights, tracking player speed, intensity and ground coverage.

Once ClearSky has been installed across an extended stadium network, it will deliver unrivalled real-time insights that Champion Data will integrate to support its broadcast commitments, such as the Telstra Tracker, and create a more engaging experience for fans during live matches. 

This announcement comes days after the Company integrated its MatchMaker video analysis platform with Vector wearables to deliver an all-in-one video and data analytics platform for athletes and teams. Its video capability was gained through a $45 million acquisition with SBG Sports Software in June 2021, where SBG developed products that can capture large amounts of live data and video for race strategy. SBG has worked with some of the biggest names in motorsports including, Formula 1, Formula E and IndyCar. 

Catapult shares have been tracking down for most of most of 2021, reaching a peak of $2.24 in May and falling to $1.11 at the time of writing.