Silicon Valley startup TuringSense has just raised a $3 million round of seed funding. The company, which pioneers a biomechanically based tennis sensor system called PIVOT, received funding from a variety of sources.
Three companies from China invested largely—Angel Plus, ChinaRock Capital and Zen Water Capital, along with one Indonesian company, Ideosource. One American group made it onto the list of major investors, which discounted funding from entrepreneurs and angel investors, and that was Palo Alto based SV Tech Ventures.
Never miss tennis technology news with the SportTechie newsletter!
While there are a few tennis-focused sensors on the market, like Sony’s Smart Tennis Sensor, they attach to the racket and look solely at swing.
PIVOT uses a number of sensors, as many as fifteen at times, that attach to the body and track the exact biomechanics of each swing. Users can use as few as five or as many as fifteen to get the data they would like, each sensor connecting to different joints with straps.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhrFFtjo02U
The system also, uniquely, does not need the help of a camera to track movements. Players can view their data in real-time, over their mobile device. From there, they can save sessions that can be shared with coaches or anyone else.
TuringSense’s focus on China is two-fold, seeing as their CEO Limin hails from that nation, attending Fudan University in Shangai before making the jump to UC Berkley for a PhD. But tennis is also a very new sport in China, increasing in popularity very rapidly. Tennis star Li Na was ranked at No. 2 in the world before having to retire seven months later due to injury.
“Being able to attract such prestigious investors is recognition of the large market potential of our cutting-edge wearable technology with its innovative multi-sensor, high-speed full-body motion analysis,” said Limin. “This funding gives us the financial strength to advance our goals of revolutionizing the way sports are played, practiced, and coached by transforming training methods that enable athletes to optimize technique and prevent injuries.”
Nonetheless, this system does have its advantages beyond the market of East Asia, as PIVOT’s technology is incredibly thorough in its evaluation of a tennis player’s movements and swing. Despite the fact that it may be a pain to put on all of those sensors, it surely offers players a conclusive look at the way in which they move and can improve.