SBJ Power Up: Talking tech with Aliyah Boston

Sports Business Journal

31 January 2023

Today, one of college basketball's best players explains how technology is pushing her game forward in an exclusive interview with SBJ Tech.

Also:

New AI feature coming from HourOne
Whoop, Hyperice sync up technologies
How streaming will impact NASCAR TV talks
Globant puts immersive services under one umbrella

South Carolina star Aliyah Boston dishes on sports tech

The latest player featured in our Athlete's Voice series is Aliyah Boston, the star forward at South Carolina who was named last year's NCAA Tournament Most Outstanding Player after becoming the first male or female basketball player to win the Naismith Trophy as overall player of the year as well as Naismith Defensive Player of the Year.

Boston, who counts Under Armour, Bose, Orangetheory Fitness and Six Star Pro Nutrition among her NIL partners, talks to SBJ Tech about recovery methods, sports science devices, tracking sleep and more. "I got a little nervous before I go to sleep at 1:00 AM," Boston jokes in reference to her Oura ring. "And then my strength coach sees that and she's like, ‘Why are you not in bed?’" Read the full interview here.

Sports clients could benefit from HourOne's latest AI tool

HourOne, the text-to-video artificial intelligence company that creates virtual avatars for broadcasters, has launched a new script-writing feature called Script Wizard that integrates Open AI’s GPT3 language model from its viral ChatGPT chatbot, SBJ's Andrew Cohen reports. Media clients can use Hour One’s platform to enter basic script prompts on the topic they want covered for GPT3’s generative AI to create written scripts for video content.

“It will be interesting to see how sports clients actually end up using the tool within our platform,” said Hour One’s head of strategy Natalie Monbiot. “I think what we envisage is it will be more for creative purposes, like 'how do I say this in a more dynamic way?' This script feels a bit flat; I want it to be more dynamic or youthful. I want the vibe to be different. Or actually, to be honest with you, I want this rewritten entirely.”

German sports media outlet Ran has used Hour One’s pre-recorded virtual human avatars to read scripts for soccer video content, allowing the company to save on studio production costs associated with live broadcasts.

Whoop, Hyperice integrating users' data

Whoop and Hyperice users can now share data, via Apple Health, to quantify their recovery activities, thanks to the first in a series of partnership activations from the two sports tech companies.

Those who use Hyperice's Hypervolt or Normatec devices can see changes in their Whoop-monitored biometrics and see recommendations for recovery routines based on their physical activity.

This is the latest sync-up of two brands in the wellness space, after Ōura Health and Therabody in the fall integrated their technologies to provide users enhanced recovery and sleep data and guidance. Ōura Health last summer also teamed with athletic social network Strava, enabling wearers of the Oura Ring to directly import their Strava workouts into its wellness monitoring platform.

NASCAR ispotentially creating a third TV package that it could sell to one of the deep-pocketed streaming companies. This could make the racing circuit let its exclusive negotiating window with incumbent media-rights partners with Fox and NBC, which has already begun, end without a deal, according to sources cited by SBJ's John Ourand.

Amazon is likely to be the most aggressive streamer to pursue NASCAR rights. However, it appears unlikely that NASCAR would carve out a package of Cup Series races for a streaming company, given the need to provide the broadest reach for sponsors aligned with those races and the teams that compete in them.

Around the sports tech industry

Globant is aggregating its bevy of immersive services to create a Sports Reinvention Studio that will help teams and leagues accentuate their fan experience efforts. Buoyed by its recent successful integrations with FIFA+, the Clippers and LaLiga, Globant is packaging its offerings under one umbrella. SBJ's Tom Friend has .

Stats Perform’s priority on betting transparency has led the data provider to become the first sports gambling operator to earn the International Betting Integrity Association Data Standards accreditation for three straight years.

Flying electric car racing series Airspeeder has signed a two-year broadcast content deal with Fox Sports Australia. Last year’s inaugural EXA Series was a remotely-piloted competition but Airspeeder has designed electric vertical take-off and landing vehicles to be manned by human pilots for races in the near future.