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Sony buys StatSports - The Sport for Business Daily
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Sony acquires a majority stake in StatSports, bringing wearables into a broader stack that already includes Hawkeye and Beyond Sports to build a hybrid tracking future. We also highlight Ireland’s growing sports tech ecosystem, preview Analytics Summit 2025, and scan today’s key headlines.
• StatSports’ journey from Newry startup to global leader in wearables
• Sony’s strategy to fuse optical and wearable data for richer insights
• Impact on Irish sports tech talent, jobs and R&D
• How hybrid tracking could change coaching, medical and fan experiences
• Preview of Analytics Summit 2025 with Kitman Labs
• Dublin Marathon entry changes for 2026
• Budget reactions from Federation of Irish Sport and IRFU
• Funding outlook for horse and greyhound racing
• World Sailing Championships results and daily TV guide
• Where to subscribe and how to get in touch
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Hello and welcome to the Sport for Business Daily. My name is Rob Hartnett. I'm your host and the editor on Sport for Business. In today's five-minute audio version of the content which is produced daily on sportforbusiness.com, we are looking at the world of sports technology and the sale of a majority stake in Yuri-based Stat Sports to the global multinational Sony. One of Ireland's sports technology success stories is entering a new chapter with confirmation that Sony has acquired a majority stake in Stat Sports, the newly-based performance tracking company whose wearable devices are used by many of the world's leading teams. Founded by Alan Clark and Sean O'Connor, StatSports grew from a small Northern Irish startup into a global leader in athletic monitoring. Its GPS vests and sensors have become a familiar sight on training pitches from the Premier League to the Bundesliga to the NFL, trusted for the precision data they provide on speed, load, distance, and performance. Now the company joins the ranks of Sony's expanding sports technology portfolio, which already includes Hawkeye innovations, Beyond Sports, Kino Tracks, and Pulse Live. The acquisition brings together Sony's strength in optical tracking and data visualization with StatSports expertise in wearable tech. It creates what many see as the foundation for a next generation hybrid athlete tracking system. In announcing the deal, Sony described it as a strategic move to enhance the integration of wearable and optical data to provide richer insights for teams, leagues and fans. While the financial details were not disclosed, the acquisition is understood to represent a significant investment and an endorsement of StatSports innovation and global reach. From an early adoption from the Irish national teams to global partnerships with Man United, Juventus, and the US Soccer Federation, StatSports has consistently been at the forefront of elite performance technology. The deal is a major vote of confidence in the Island of Ireland's growing technology ecosystem, particularly in Newry, where StatSports employs more than a hundred people. The partnership with Sony is expected to support further growth in engineering, research and development, and international market expansion. Sony's sports division, meanwhile, has been steadily assembling the pieces of what is now a comprehensive data and analytics platform, with Hawkeye providing officiating and optical insights. Beyond sports adding real-time visualization and virtual rendering, and now Stat Sports delivering wearable data, Sony is positioning itself as one of the most powerful integrated data providers in global sport. The deal underscores the strength of innovation emerging from the intersection of sport and technology here, a space that continues to punch above its weight on the world stage. From kit suppliers to analytics firms and from grassroots to global, the country's contribution to sports digital transformation continues to grow. Later on this afternoon, I'm going to be on stage at the Analytics Summit 2025, having a fireside chat with Mark Hill, the head of AI product innovation, at uh at Kitman Labs, another one of Ireland's great success stories. We spoke to Stephen Smith on the main Sport for Business podcast in recent weeks. Worth a listen if you want to dip into that. Elsewhere on Sport for Business today, on Thursday, October the 9th, we are looking at a more open Dublin marathon entry system from 2026 onwards. We look back on the budget with more reaction from the Federation of Irish Sport and the IRFU. We're looking at how horse racing and greyhound racing have been left static in terms of their funding for 2026. Some mixed fortunes on day two at the World Sailing Championships and all of the usual features, including our daily guide to sport on TV and streaming, and the number of six jobs that we have currently advertised on our jobs page, looking to get you more and more involved in the world of sport. To find out more about what we do every day on Sport for Business, you can visit us at our website, sportforbusiness.com. And if you have a chat or you want to have a word about something that you think that we might be covering, either on the Sport for Business Daily, in our main podcast, or on the website, you can reach out to me, Rob, at sportforbusiness.com. Please do subscribe wherever you get your podcast from. We're on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all the usual sources, and we also publish the podcast daily at our website, sportforbusiness.com. Have a great rest of the day, and we will be back with you tomorrow. It's just, you know, this is a stuff of dreams.
