Scoutee, a new pitching accessory dubbed as the world’s first smart speed radar, was recently launched by the company of the same name through a Kickstarter campaign. Developed by a group operating out of Slovenia’s capital city of Ljubljana, the startup has a little over a month to realize its $50,000 goal. The compact radar works by transmitting data it records through being placed beyond the target of a pitcher to an app on the user’s’ mobile device. By providing pitch type, location, and result information, the Scoutee team hopes to give any player across the globe the opportunity to showcase their talents without having to rely solely on statistics and scouting.
CEO and co-founder Miha Uhan is familiar with the struggle of gaining professional recognition for players who grow up in areas of the world where baseball is not a popular sport. Uhan first discovered his love of baseball when he attended an Indians-Marlins game while visiting relatives in Akron. He took his passion back to Slovenia where he would eventually become a pitcher for his country’s national team. His achievements notwithstanding, Uhan’s dreams to play professionally in America never materialized. Scoutee CMO Majda Dodevska, also a co-founder, trusts that their product can revolutionize baseball worldwide.
“Despite Miha’s talent, he lacked the stats, video, and other metrics that would support his case; as baseball in Europe is still developing. At Scoutee we all live by the saying “life is a game, baseball is serious” and truly believe that our solution can help improve sports talent and change lives of millions of young athletes around the world.”
A few years into his post-baseball academic career, Uhan began to learn about just how far-reaching baseball actually is, even in countries where other sports dominate. Uhan knew how helpful a smart speed radar could be and together with Majda began to assemble a team to develop his idea. Scoutee legitimized following the addition of industry experts of various fields such as hardware development, electrical engineering, and digital signal processing.
“The magic of Scoutee is based on the application of traditional Doppler radar technology that our team of experts managed to actualize into a palm-sized device. One of the smallest radars on the market, Scoutee is able to measure the speed of the ordinary ball from up to 130 feet away and transfer the data via Bluetooth to an app on a smartphone with an error of ± 1mph.”
A major component of the app is giving access to video with pitch data overlaid. This gives players the luxury of being able to send detailed pitching videos out to anyone. Scoutee also stores months of user data that can be used to track improvements in performance. Always keeping the current state of baseball in mind, the team made sure to add an additional setting for player safety.
“We want every young player to be safe and to train responsibly, which is why we also included a very important feature in the app – a pitch count with an adjustable pitch limit that displays a warning once that limit is reached.”
If Scoutee reaches their Kickstarter goal, they plan to deliver Scoutee before the start of the 2016 baseball season. The company eventually envisions expansion into other sports, already having received interest from various potential partners.
“We firmly believe Scoutee can become a very popular device for sports analytics, not only for baseball but for other sports as well. Our mission is to empower young athletes worldwide by providing them with a simple and affordable tool they can use for training, for monitoring their progress and to expose their talent.”
The team will be exhibiting their radar at TechCrunch Disrupt’s Hardware Alley at the end of the month to further raise awareness for Scoutee at this critical time. Meeting the Kickstarter goal will be the biggest step yet for Scoutee in their quest to make a lasting impact in the baseball tech industry.