Zebra continues to power Next Gen Stats as NFL’s Official On-Field Player Tracking Provider

LINCOLNSHIRE, Ill.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Zebra Technologies Corporation(NASDAQ: ZBRA), an innovator at the edge of the enterprise with solutions and partners that enable businesses to gain a performance edge, today announced the renewal of its partnership with the NFL, extending Zebra’s role as the League’s Official On-Field Player-Tracking Provider through the 2021 season. This extension builds on the past five seasons during which Zebra has worked with the NFL to successfully implement a best-in-class player and ball tracking system, helping to launch a new era of football data and analytics known as Next Gen Stats.

Zebra captures data for the NFL by attaching RFID tags in player equipment and the football, transmitting real-time location data to receivers positioned around the stadium. The Zebra MotionWorks™ Sporttracking system captures metrics such as player speed, distance traveled, orientation and proximity, and acceleration/deceleration. This information is then utilized by the NFL to calculate vast amounts of information about every player for every play.

The Next Gen Stats data is used to enhance the fan experience both at home as well as in-stadium. The data helps to convey unique, engaging details about individual and team performances, as well as season-long trends, allowing fans to understand the game in a whole new way. Used by everyone from the casual viewer to the fantasy football fanatic, these insights provide fans, media, and teams with helpful and interesting information for every game, every week, throughout the entire season.

"We are pleased to extend our relationship with Zebra to further develop and share cutting-edge insights into the game of football,” said Matt Swensson, Vice President of Emerging Products & Technology, National Football League.“We’re excited to build on our partnership, and collectively advance the League’s commitment to innovation. In the coming seasons, we plan to further develop the Next Gen Stats platform, allowing coaches, players, and fans to understand the game in ways never possible before.”

NFL Club personnel use Next Gen Stats data to inform a variety of decisions, from play design to player workload, and to formulate specific practice plans.

“We are very excited to continue our work with the NFL, and we are committed to ongoing innovation to provide the League, teams and fans with real-time tracking data and insights for years to come,” said John Pollard, Vice President of Zebra Sports Business Development, Zebra Technologies. “Based on our collaborative approach, this extension validates the value of our real-time locationing technology in football to give those on the front line a performance edge.”

Earlier this year, Gartner, Inc. recognized Zebra as a Visionary in the Magic Quadrant for Indoor Location Services, Global for the second consecutive year. Part of Zebra’s market leading locationing portfolio, the MotionWorks Sport solution is powered by Zebra’s Savanna data platform which transforms information into insights to help teams make the best possible decisions.

2019-20 SEASON HIGHLIGHTS

• Inspired by the proven success of Zebra’s tracking system in each stadium, a growing number of NFL clubs — about a third of the League – are using Zebra’s practice tracking solution to capture player and ball tracking information for each of their practice sessions throughout the season.
• All six international NFL games will utilize Zebra’s technology to capture Next Gen Stats: five International Series games, two at the new Tottenham Stadium in London (Oct. 6 and 13), two at Wembley Stadium (Oct. 27 and Nov. 3) in London, and one in Mexico City at Estadio Azteca (Nov. 18). Additionally, the pre-season game at Investors Group Field in Winnipeg, Canada (Aug. 22) will be equipped with Zebra’s technology.
• Zebra will tag 2,880 players plus all the officials during the pre-season, with nearly 1,700 players tagged during the regular season. In addition, a total of 20,000 instrumented footballs will be used, enabling the collection of real-time location, speed and rotation data for the footballs.
• The 2019-20 season celebrates the NFL’s 100^th anniversary and Zebra’s 50^th anniversary.

Gartner, Magic Quadrant for Indoor Location Services, Global, Tim Zimmerman, Annette Zimmermann, 28 January 2019.

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ABOUT ZEBRA

Zebra (NASDAQ: ZBRA) empowers the front line of business in retail/ecommerce, manufacturing, transportation and logistics, healthcare and other industries to achieve a performance edge. With more than 10,000 partners across 100 countries, we deliver industry-tailored, end-to-end solutions that intelligently connect people, assets and data to help our customers make business-critical decisions. Our market-leading solutions elevate the shopping experience, track and manage inventory as well as improve supply chain efficiency and patient care. Ranked on Forbes’ list of America’s Best Employers for the last four years, Zebra helps our customers capture their edge. For more information, visit www.zebra.com or sign up for our news alerts. Follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook.

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Media Contact:
Therese Van Ryne
Zebra Technologies
+1-847-370-2317
[email protected]

Source: Zebra Technologies Corporation