U.S.-based wearable sport equipment company TuringSense just launched PIVOT in beta version, a tech that records and analyzes tennis player’s body movement. PIVOT is designed by combining biomechanic technology, sensor, and artificial intelligence to help tennis athletes learning how to play it right, avoid injuries, and analyze the game. TuringSense’s Vice President of Product and Marketing Chris Lim (also known as Taufik Arifin) stated that PIVOT was initially focused for taekwondo. However, after series of analysis and survey, the team pivoted to tennis.
There are several basic reasons behind it. The main reason is that while there are at least 50 million tennis players all over the world, there’s only a few beneficial biometric tech available for them. The most fundamental information that people may receive is on how long it takes to be pro at tennis. PIVOT is designed for that matter.
Besides analyzing someone’s movement while playing tennis, the data will be sent and analized by a real-time system (which is available on mobile as well).
Compared to other motion capture technologies, such as Microsoft Kinect or other similar wearable technologies, PIVOT claims that it excels in capturing higher motions, as the device is directly equipped to user’s body, not to mention that it has multi-sensors. Moreover, PIVOT is based on the concept of data-driven, meaning that it may provide constructive insight to improve the user’s playing skill and style.
At the moment, PIVOT is still in beta version. The team plan on launching the Kickstarter campaign this coming November.
Indonesia to be one of TuringSense’s R&D centers
After finishing the product, TuringSense plans on bringing it to Asia, especially China and Indonesia. As TuringSense’s CTO Dr. Joseph Chamdani stated, there’s a team in Indonesia which is and will keep on developing the user interface of PIVOT’s supporting app. The company even plans on building its Research and Development team in the aforementioned two countries.
In the future, TuringSense plans on expanding its sport sensor to other fields, such as for physical therapy, rehabilitation equipment, obedience in life insurance, and virtual/augmented reality for video games.
Led by two Indonesian leaders
TuringSense was founded by IT experts and an athletes. Two out of three, namely Chris Lim (VP of Product and Marketing) and Dr. Joseph Chamdani (CTO and VP of Research and Development) even originate from Indonesia.
Lim is an industry veteran who has gathered more than 27 years of experience in management and engineering. He is now also the Executive Management Team at Plato Design. He has patented three inventions in the U.S., while being a prominent taekwondo athlete.
Meanwhile, Chamdani (Joe) is an innovator in sport. He’s quite active in entrepreneurship, as he founded Sanera and Kickfire, which have been acquired by McData and Teradata. He have held 46 patents, and is waiting for other 35 ones to be completed. He loves wearable tech, as well as tennis and golf.
Translated by Rifki Aria Nugraha