January 27 – Germany’s DFL has moved beyond its traditional football business and acquired an equity stake in MOVEZ, a mobile app start-up for football skills evaluation.
The investment is part of the ‘DFL for Equity’ strategy aimed at establishing positions in aligned football-sector business opportunities where the German league can use its assets to enhance the business.
MOVEZ, based in Israel, is majority-owned by AGT International, a specialist in artificial intelligence and web-based technologies. The DFL will marketing and content assets to the investment.
MOVEZ’s smartphone app will use computer vision and artificial intelligence to evaluate skills in ball related activities. The application is aimed mainly at children and teenagers to see how their sporting skills measure up. MOVEZ’ artificial intelligence software tracks ball related activity in real time via the smartphone camera allowing users to perform drills, play ball games and compete against each other through their mobile device.
The DFL is providing comparative drills with players from the Bundesliga and is giving the self-learning algorithms of MOVEZ access to its own data and media archives.
DFL CEO Christian Seifert said: “MOVEZ is a very exciting addition to our ‘DFL for Equity’ strategy and at the same time the first investment whose utility is aimed directly at Bundesliga fans around the globe. Especially for the young football fans of Generation Z, its approach playfully combines the digital world and real physical activity. We see a great deal of potential for this investment.”
It is unclear whether the DFL is making a cash investment or is, more likely, receiving its equity stake via the assets it is providing. It is the third investment coming out of the DFL for Equity programme.
Yuval Benyamini, MOVEZ CEO, said: “DFL is one of football’s greatest foundations and we are proud to have them on board. This partnership will allow us to enrich our user experience and empower millions of youngsters to compete and enjoy ball games in a new way and measure up with their professional idols.”
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