Israeli Firm Stats, Founded For Military Purposes, Now A Prominent Sports Technology

Israeli technology company Stats, which began developing technologies for missile detection and tracking, is using the European U21 Championship to "set its sights on players and balls," according to Nacho Silván of MARCA. Stats Dir Hanoch Rahimi said, "The founder of the company worked with the military industry, because, in reality, the technology we use is similar to that which has been used to track missiles. We created a camera, we program it and we can track a ball or a missile. There are many different aspects, of course, but the idea is very similar. At the end of the day, you have to survive." Stats works with more than half the teams in the NBA, the NFL, the Champions League and the European U21 Championship. Just two suitcases of equipment are needed for a football match, "inside which are three small cameras that identify each player, detecting and processing every move" (MARCA, 6/14).