NV Play’s game-changing cricket software named as winner at global Sports Technology Awards
Christchurch, New Zealand, 11 May 2021 – NV Play Cricket, a global cricket scoring, analytics, broadcast and high-performance solution, has been named the Best Elite Performance Technology winner in the Sports Technology Awards 2021 via a virtual ceremony in the UK.
The game-changing software used by cricket teams worldwide, including England, USA, Netherlands, and New Zealand, has scored 50,000 cricket matches, tracked 190,000 players, and captured 25 million balls – and its online match centre has over 5 million views weekly.
The Sports Technology Awards, the leading global celebration of technology-led innovation across the international sports sector, is held annually to highlight outstanding advances in the industry. The 2021 Awards, which received nominations across 50 sports, 30 countries and five continents, was judged by over 50 leading influencers from the world of sport and technology.
NV Play also made the shortlist for Best Digital Technology and Best Broadcast Technology categories, alongside its win for Best Elite Performance Technology. This follows the company being named as the Established Startup of the Year 2020 in the precursor STA Startups Awards just prior to its third birthday late last year.
“We’re on a mission to help teams grow and shape the future of cricket. NV Play Cricket democratizes access to elite tools whilst embracing the spirit of the game that we love.”
Gus Pickering
Technical Director, NV Play
Matt Pickering, Managing Director of NV Play, says: “It’s incredibly humbling to see NV Play Cricket named a winner alongside some of the biggest names in sports technology."
"Our success today reflects the fantastic support we’ve received from our partners and friends at England & Wales Cricket Board, New Zealand Cricket, and the other dozen or so nations across Europe, Asia and Africa that we are privileged to work with every day,” he says.
NV Play, formed in 2018 as a spinout of digital agency NV Interactive, is built on 15 years of experience developing elite cricket solutions at the international level. The company’s foray into cricket began with a scoring platform in 2005 for ESPNcricinfo, and has grown over the past 15 years to deliver digital, operational and analytical services to some of the biggest names in the game.
NV Play's software for elite, professional and club cricket features live scoring, live video, video highlights, ball-by-ball statistics, high-performance analytics and predictive insights. The cloud-connected solution embraces Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence, including automation, predictive analysis and rich insights for coaching and player development.
The shortlist for this year’s awards featured 117 brands, 30 sports, 19 sports bodies, ten broadcasters, nine tournaments, and technology brands of all sizes. Many of this year’s award-winners were initiatives that were created to tackle challenges presented by the global pandemic, most notably the work of Ticketmaster Sport, Star Sports India, WWE and F1.
Stars in attendance at the 2021 Sports Technology Awards included racing driver Mark Webber, Double Olympic Champion Triathlete Alistair Brownlee, South African International and Rugby World Cup Winner Bryan Habana, former International Footballer turned tech entrepreneur Louis Saha, and multi-Olympic champion sailor Sir Ben Ainslie.
Rebecca Hopkins, STA Group CEO, said: “We’ve experienced unprecedented times, but Covid has made sport use technology to solve new problems in innovative ways. As a result, the calibre of entries has been truly staggering in vision and creativity."
"Our judges love seeing the cutting edge of sport, but this year has been like no other; the way the industry has responded is a source of great pride to all concerned. Indisputably, technology has put sport in a great place to do exciting things both now and when the world eventually returns to normal”.
Pickering adds, “NV Play has been instrumental in delivering live streamed cricket to millions of fans across the world during two Covid-impacted seasons, and we’re now seeing UK county games streamed through our platform being broadcast on SkyTV in the UK.
“Despite the challenges of the past year, we’re growing quickly – adding ten new cricket nations as NV customers over the past year. We’ve also doubled the size of the product team as we prepare to scale our technology worldwide. We have some very exciting opportunities ahead,” he says.