New technology from startup ventures is transforming the sports industry. The mission of our Startup Profile Series is to introduce startup companies in the sports technology space to a broader audience and allow founders of new ventures to tell their story. This particular article is profiling one of the five startups in the second Stadia Ventures Accelerator, which is culminating in a Demo Day on June 16th in St. Louis.
Company name: Senaptec
Founder(s): Joe Bingold, Herb Yoo, Pete Naschak, Jason Mihalik
Headquarters: Beaverton, OR
1. What is your elevator pitch?
Why was Babe Ruth such an amazing hitter? It was not for his stellar nutrition or strength and conditioning. His senses. Researchers at Columbia University determined his sensory performance was 10-20% faster than the average man. This makes all the difference when hitting a fastball!
Senaptec provides the tools for all people to assess their sensory performance, show how they stack up to their competition (e.g., other NFL football quarterbacks), and then improve the areas of their senses with greatest opportunity. Our mission is to empower athletes to see like Babe!
2. Problem & Solution
Sub-par sensory performance could cost an athlete the game or a military member their life. Just like you can train your muscles, you can train your senses. Senaptec tools show where you need to train and then give you the ability to improve your sensory performance.
- Sensory Station – The sensory station assesses 10 parameters of an athlete’s sensory performance that are critical to their success in sports. The station then uses our proprietary database of athlete profiles and shows how this athlete compares to their competition based on sport, level, and position (e.g., baseball, high school, pitcher). With these results in hand, the sensory station also provides training recommendations to best improve their sensory performance.
- Strobe Eyewear – Think of the strobe eyewear as resistance training for the brain. The lenses flicker between transparent and opaque, which limits the amount of visual data going to the brain. A person wears them while practicing the activity (e.g., catching a ball) that they want to improve. When wearing the strobes, their brain is getting only snapshots of the data it craves to make good decisions. Consequently, the brain must speed up its reaction time and also start incorporating data it was otherwise ignoring. After practicing with the strobes, the perception is that the world is moving more slowly and you can perceive greater detail.
3. Market – your target market and the overall market
Our target market is athletes of all types and levels. This includes military, police, and fire. We also work closely with optometrists and universities performing vision research.
4. Business Model – how do you make money?
Senaptec primarily makes money by selling products. We sell our full sensory station, a tablet-based sensory station, and training tools (e.g., strobe eyewear, anticipatory timing light rail).
5. Management Team – with titles
Joe Bingold – CEO
Herb Yoo – CTO
Pete Naschak – VP of Business Development
Jason Mihalik, PhD – Chief Research Officer
6. What else do you want the audience to know about your venture?
Improving sensory performance is the next phase in the rise of human performance. Now is the time to move. If you want to gain the edge on your competition or just feel more aware of your environment, our solutions will empower you.