Sports Video Analysis - Market Study

  Sports Video Analysis

1.    Introduction

S

ports organizations are increasingly becoming aware of the need to incorporate analytics into their decision making processes and on the other side sports coaching industry is experiencing growth as intensive sports instruction demand surges and one of the major aims of sports video analysis is to provide assistance for training. Coaches and athletes are using the medium more and more to measure and correct technique, and to analyze team and individual performances.

In Sport, systems have been developed to provide a high level of task, performance and physiological data to coaches, teams and players. The objective is to improve individual and team performance and/or analyse opposition patterns of play to give tactical advantage. The repetitive and patterned nature of sports games lend themselves to video analysis in that over a period of time real patterns, trends or habits can be discerned. In the past decades, extensive research efforts have been devoted to sports video analysis and applications due to its wide viewer-ship and high commercial potentials.

2.    US Sports Market Size

Sports are big business. Combined, the “Big 4” leagues in America, the National Football League (NFL), National Basketball Association (NBA), the National Hockey League (NHL) and Major League Baseball (MLB), bring in about $24 billion in revenue during a typical year, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.  U.S. sporting equipment sales at retail sporting goods stores are roughly $41 billion yearly, according to U.S. government statistics. 

“A reasonable estimate of the total U.S. sports market would be $400 to $435 billion yearly” –

Plunkett Research, Ltd

Official U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics figures as of 2011 found that there were 12,630 professional American athletes plus 193,810 coaches and scouts, along with 15,630 umpires, referees and officials. Meanwhile, the data showed that 489,200 Americans work in fitness centers, 39,700 work in snow skiing facilities, 68,300 work in bowling centers and 342,300 work at country clubs or golf courses. 

3.    Sports Video Analysis Potential  

Sports video analysis has been attracting more and more attention due to the potential commercial benefits, entertaining functionalities and mass audience requirements. However, more keenly than ever, the audience desire professional insights into the games. The coach and the players demand automatic tactics analysis and performance evaluation with the aid of multimedia information retrieval technologies.

“Sports coaching overall (not just private) is a $3-7 billion global market, without including fitness training” – CoachUp founder, Jordan Fliegel

According to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, employment of coaches is expected to grow 29% by 2020, much faster than the average for all occupations and the usage of the technology is on high demand will be predicted to grow in parallel as larger overall population will continue to participate in organized sports for entertainment, recreation, and physical conditioning, boosting demand for coaches and sports instructors. 100 million kids and adults who spend $6 billion on sports coaching in the U.S. alone is one of the major drivers for the growth in this industry.

4.    Prominent Players

 

 

5.    Video Analysis Apps for Sports

 

 

Everyday more and more applications are being created to help the coaches to navigate and interact with the world. Mobile applications for coaching are no exception and there are many that one can access effortlessly and with minimal cost.

There are many free downloadable sports video analysis software available in the market and especially in the app world today, the sports video analysis has been playing an important role and were built on famous platforms like iOS, Android etc.., which have the fastest acceptance rate.

6.    Open source (Free Downloadable) Software

 

7.    Competition

There are many companies across all of sports who offer advanced video analysis systems. Video analysis apps in the market are taking the large portion. Coaches and players alike have the ability to download video on their smart phones and tablets are making the competition fierce. Packaged based services and the pricing ranges plays a vital role in the market competition, as typically the prices range anywhere from $850 to $3000 for the software.

The perception of the coaches has shifted towards the adoption of the latest and advanced technology can make them better instructor, manager and leader and they need to grab a hold or be left behind is fueling the market and the competition.

8.    Venture Funding

The funding for this industry mostly comes from Google Ventures, Atlas Venture, Boston Seed Capital, and TyDanco, an angel investor.

9.    Conclusion

There's no excuse for not introducing video analysis into coaching. With current costs of technology, the opportunity exists for everyone. In coaching, effective communication between coach and athlete is fundamental to the success of the relationship and video vastly improves the effectiveness of that communication.

Of course, until technology is good enough to have X-ray cameras from the boundary at a live game and one can’t ever be 100 per cent sure that person’s testing is perfect. It is sure that in 10 years’ time there will be more of advanced technology which will play more vital role in sports video analysis arena.