DDSports ShotTracker technology can extend from basketball to soccer and other sports
Through
DDSports, the parent company of the ShotTracker sensor basketball system, is exploring plans to expand its tracking technology to other sports, including soccer. ShotTracker currently captures shot analytics for 60 college basketball programs, including all of the men’s and women’s teams from the Big 12 and Mountain West conferences.
“We do quite a bit of testing in football and looking at other sports,” DDSports co-founder and president Davyeon Ross said at the Sports Business Journal’s Dealmakers In Sports conference in New York on Wednesday. “We are currently doing more extensive testing with football and have initial discussions with some of the sports to enter the market.”
ShotTracker the current basketball system involves sensors built into game balls, players’ shirts and also inside arenas–to track over 70 shooting stats that can be viewed on iPad by coaches and players during matches. Another point of future growth for DDSports will be the sharing of its real-time data with sports betting companies.
“We know we can strengthen a whole level of play that has never been seen before,” said Ross. “Were [currently] make integrations to prepare for these opportunities.
Ross has admitted that his company’s gaming ambitions will, at least initially, be more focused on the professional level than the college space. A professional team already partner of ShotTracker is the Phoenix Suns of the NBA. ShotTracker has made deals with networks like ESPN and CBS to display their stats on college basketball shows, and Ross sees more lucrative opportunities to capitalize on data at the college level rather than in professional leagues.
“It’s harder to work in college because they’re so fragmented,” he said. “But once you are able to capitalize on that market, the cap is removed. Because you are not just a technology partner, you are a technology and data marketing partner. You can get license fees all day, but the marketing part [is] where you come together to say, ‘How can we use this data? When you work with the leagues, they’re like, ‘Okay you’re a salesperson, give me the data, I’ll make all the money’. So there is a very different dynamic.