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Welcome to the Atlanta Tennis Podcast.

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We talk with coaches, club managers,

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And now let's get into our recent conversation with Swupnil,

the co-founder and CEO of Swing Vision,

which is the app bringing automated stats, highlights,

and now line calling to all tennis players

using just your iPhone.

It sounds like voodoo magic, but it works.

Have a listen and let us know what you think.

(upbeat music)

Who are you?

Who is Swupnil and why do we care?

- Yeah, so I'm Swupnil and co-founder and CEO

of Swing Vision, which is a company

that's bringing automated stats, highlights,

and now line calling to all tennis players

using just your iPhone.

So sounds like voodoo magic, but it actually works.

And to give you a bit more background on myself,

so prior to Swing Vision, I was working at Tesla

and their autonomous driving team.

So I have a lot of experience in using cameras

to track moving objects like cars and pedestrians.

And that's really where the idea for Swing Vision

first came about.

I've also been a lifelong tennis player,

so that's been my main sport. I grew up playing

with my brother and my dad.

And we watched a lot of tennis growing up.

I'm a huge tennis fan, so I've been to all the grand sums

in person.

I'm just a big fan of the sport

and always wanted a way to just track my game.

That was really the fundamental question.

I was like, what's my first sort of percentage?

Like how often am I converting breakpoints?

Like I have no idea about these basic stats

that everybody seems to know for pro's on TV.

And so that was the initial kind of reason

that I would create Swing Vision, but over time, it's evolved.

And it's just grown to do so much more

than just tracking your stats.

But that's just like a brief recap of myself and what I do.

And I think what Swing Vision is doing

is really changing the sport the way it's being played.

And this is so timely coming on here to talk with you guys

because we just came up of our first USTA event ever.

It's probably the first amateur event ever

that was officiated using electronic line calling.

And it was officiated using Swing Vision.

- Nice.

- So it's pretty, yeah, it's very good timing.

And this year's gonna be a big year for us, for sure.

- All right, so that brings me in the beginning

to kind of my first two questions.

And it's kind of difficult to ask them both at the same time,

but I'm curious as to your playing career,

did you play in college?

Were you a high level player?

Where'd you go with your playing career?

I'll start there.

- Yeah, so I played in high school.

And then I, so I went to Berkeley for a undergrad.

So I played, I tried to make the club team,

but the club team at Berkeley is basically like a D3 team.

So it was pretty tough.

Did not make the team lost like first or second

around every time I tried out.

So I played in terminal for the most part.

And my focus was primarily just like academics

for the most part of my life.

And I was so academic that after that,

I went to Columbia to get my PhD in statistics.

So I was trying to become a professor actually.

But I still tried to play a lot of tennis.

Even when I was out there, I played in terminal,

played on some of the green clay courts out there

in New York, which is super fun.

And then kind of after I finished my PhD,

came back to California work at Tussle-Oblad

and I was playing at USTA League.

So, you know, I typically play in like four O leagues.

But these days it's because now I've moved to LA.

I kind of commute back and forth between SoCal and Norkal

because most of our team is based in Norkal.

So it's a lot harder for me now to do like USTA leaks,

but I mostly just play with our team.

So we have like team tennis after work.

So that's been super fun.

And so we play a lot and we use the app a lot, obviously.

So it's been, it's been pretty good.

- Got it. And got it from Berkeley to Tesla.

That makes sense.

So that's my next obvious question.

You say it seems like magic.

We had somebody ask that the other day.

So okay, well, we've got this statistics thing

that we can do.

All right, cool.

And then Bobby looks up, says,

wait, you have to do it yourself?

I wait a minute.

Swing vision just magically do it.

And I guess if you can make sure a car

doesn't bump into other things,

you probably should be able to figure out a tennis ball.

Am I simplifying that, of course?

- Yeah, no, I mean, I think that's accurate, right?

Like I think tracking cars is pretty hard,

especially because the car itself is moving.

And so that makes it even more challenging.

But what's been interesting is like tennis is more challenging

in some other way.

So the nice thing for us is your iPhone is just sitting there

at the back of the court, it's not moving itself,

which is nice.

But the ball is very small.

And the ball is moving very fast relative to the camera.

So it's like the challenges are kind of different

with like autonomous driving.

Generally, the other cars are moving like not that fast

relative to you.

Like if you're on the highway,

you're all going like 60 to 70 miles per hour.

It's very rare that something's moving at you

like 60 miles per hour.

But in tennis, you have a ball that's coming at the camera

at like 100 miles per hour plus sometimes, right?

So that's challenging.

And then obviously we're trying to put all this data

crunching into an iPhone that only has,

whatever battery life it has.

It's not a big car with a gigantic computer.

So there's always other constraints.

So it's like very interesting.

Like it's more challenging in some ways.

Obviously, it's much easier in some ways.

But yeah, it's been a really fun problem to work on.

And a lot of the work I did at Tesla did translate over.

Obviously, it's like completely different domain.

But a lot of the same sort of principles,

I think at least give us a head start.

And I think give us some advantage over,

you know, potentially other people trying to solve it.

But yeah, it's been really fun journey.

And we've been on the app store about four and a half years now.

So finally now we're getting to the point

where the accuracy is so good that it can actually

call lines, which is, again,

it feels even more like sci-fi and hard to believe.

That's the real, from our opinion and Bobby,

I'm gonna speak for both of us

because we've had this conversation enough

that the line calling is gonna,

we think change the world.

It's one thing for me to know that I've got a,

you know, 38% for a serve percentage,

and I got to work on it.

It's another thing for me and you to go play a tennis match,

whether we like each other, know each other,

none of it matters anymore.

We can simply agree, we're gonna go with this system.

And we can, we can settle disputes.

And I think that's just gonna change things.

I know Bobby talks to people about it all the time.

Bobby is that, am I, am I with us

and that we both agree that that's gonna be just as big

if not bigger than the stats and the highlights?

- Oh, I mean, obviously,

it's gonna, it's gonna,

hopefully they could have kinder gentle points

to take that element out of it.

You know, that everybody's so preoccupied by line calls.

You know, I always try to temper and say,

I don't think anybody voluiciously does it.

Just as you get older and if you don't know,

you would spend there a lot of variables.

So take that out of it, agree upon,

we'll let somebody else handle that.

And let's just enjoy ourselves and spend more time

hitting the ball.

Hopefully we'll make it a much more pleasant experience,

especially on the junior level.

- Yeah, definitely.

I mean, that was, you know,

so this past week when we were at the Maze Cup,

which is an event where kind of the best

North Cal players play against the best so-called players.

It was a tough event for me

because I wasn't sure who to root for.

I was like, "I'm like North Cal out of heart,

"but now I live in SoCal."

But it was just amazing that all the parents felt,

like that was the first thing, which is exactly what you said,

Bobby, which is that, like,

there was so much fewer arguments.

People were just calling a lot more honestly.

And even the challenge system,

like they didn't need to use that that much

because people were just being a lot more honest.

And if they did need to use it,

it was just more because it was a very close call

and they're like, well, we might as well challenge it

because it's kind of tough to even know

that it was inter-out.

So it was just like, honest calls, honestly,

that were being challenged.

And it was funny at one point,

we were talking with the USDA SoCal

kind of senior director of competitions, her name's Maria.

And she's like, "Do you hear that?"

I was like, "What?"

She's like, "You don't hear any arguments.

"It's silent."

(laughing)

So it was funny.

And that was the big change.

And all the parents kind of echoed that same feedback.

And it was just an instant behavior change

just the presence of the system.

But then it was just so fun to see that,

the players would go up.

We had an iPad on every court, essentially,

at the net post.

So players would just go up and like,

they'd hit a challenge button.

It would show them an objective decision,

whether it's inter-out.

And it just kind of went on with the match.

And that was it.

It was just so frictional and smooth.

And it's like, this is how tennis should be played everywhere.

And you just, you kind of got to peek into the future

of how this sport should have been played this whole time.

And how the pros already played it.

So that was really fascinating.

- Yeah, great.

I've got a quick little in the weeds technical question.

What did you, how did you do that?

You got a camera up on every court.

But then you got a way to challenge.

I assume you didn't put the watches on.

You said there's a little area where the players,

the kids can go and do a challenge.

What did that look like in this scenario?

- Yeah, so I guess for some additional context

for people who aren't familiar with swing vision today,

if you download the app on your phone,

you can put your phone up.

Actually, I have this swing stick here.

So this is the best way to mount your phone.

You just touch your phone.

- I just opened mine at home.

I love it, by the way.

I can't wait.

I got a whole unboxing video I'm going to do.

- Oh, awesome.

Yeah, it's so great.

And it's like, now it's just becoming part of like,

everybody's tennis bag.

It's like, you have to have a swing stick.

- Bobby looked at me at one point.

It's like, are we really going to pay $100 for a stick?

And I said, yes.

Like, you guys see this thing.

It is, yes, more.

- And yeah, and then you just attach it on the fence

and you have your phone up there.

And so as an individual player,

if you want to challenge line calls,

the easiest way to do that is if you have an Apple Watch.

So if you have an Apple Watch paired to your phone,

you can just go and hit the challenge button.

It'll actually show you slow motion replay.

It'll give you a decision.

It'll actually say, inner out.

And so that's how it works today for individuals.

But for tournaments, it's a little bit more complicated.

You don't necessarily want to have like a watch

and everybody's hand and like,

it's also complicated to get the watch to pair

with the phone and all that.

So what we said was we're going to remove the watch

from the equation.

And so what we did is we have an iPhone on every court

at the top of the fence that's recording.

And then we have an iPad on every court at the net post

that the players can go up to and challenge.

So they don't even have to leave the court or anything.

It's just right there on the court.

They can self administer the challenge on their own.

Each player gets three challenges per set,

very similar to how the ATP used to do it before Hawkeye live.

And it just all needs is really like a Wi-Fi connection

on the courts.

And like the facility where we did this

of the Jack Kramer Club, the Wi-Fi was definitely

struggling a bit because there were so many people there

for the event.

But it was totally fine.

Like it still loaded really quickly.

And so essentially the phone is recording the match.

It's processing everything in real time.

Like as soon as the ball bounces,

the phone is already knows within like half a second,

whether it was inner out.

So it's like getting those results instantly.

And then from that iPad any time you want,

you can just check the results and they'll just kind of talk

to the phone and say, hey, give me the latest challenge.

And then we just show it on the screen.

And so that's kind of how it worked for the players.

And what was also really fun was that I and my co-founder,

we had iPads.

And those iPads would let us challenge on any court remotely,

which was really fun.

So I would just be like walking around

and I would just show it to like the parents.

So like, hey, that was a close call.

Let's just check it out.

So just for fun, I was just challenging.

And you could do that.

And I show that to the roaming officials at the event.

And they wanted that.

They're like, when can I get an iPad?

I want that future.

So it was cool to see.

But yeah, it was all just using like Wi-Fi

and just standard devices that you can buy at the Alpastore

and nothing fancy.

That is fantastic.

To Bobby's point about most people not doing it intentionally.

My theory has always been, I'm going to call more shots

in to your advantage that I'm going to either accidentally

or even intentionally get wrong calling them out.

That would be in my opinion a fascinating statistic.

Can you spit that out already that says,

here's how many shots.

Well, I guess you won't know if it was called in or out.

I mean, technically we do because like you played the point,

right?

Right.

But we do see that.

Honestly, we still call the time.

Yeah.

Yeah, we do see that all the time.

I mean, especially serves like when people are

hitting really fast serves.

And I saw it at the event.

I saw so many shots.

I was like, ooh, they probably should have challenged that

because it was actually out.

But it's like, you know, you're not going to challenge

every single serve.

It's kind of ridiculous.

But it's just hard.

And that's that summer where our long term vision for this

is to make it like Hawkeye live and where it would call it

immediately.

And so then you wouldn't have that issue of like playing a serve

that was like clearly out because you sort of had

the reverse issue where it's like, I don't really

want to challenge to serve.

Like, I don't want to slow down the game.

I actually had a pretty good return.

So like, why would I even want to challenge it?

So it's just puts you in an awkward position.

So I think that's the long term, which is like instant calls.

And there is no challenge.

It's like every shot is challenged.

So that's our vision.

And we'll probably get there in a couple of years.

But you know, one step at a time.

One step at a time.

Bobby, that makes me think of something

you say all the time.

I'm like, oh, I think we can get that done.

How about next week?

And Bobby's reminding me, so all the time, he's like, yeah,

maybe that's a next year thing, because you get some really

cool ideas and some things we want to think about.

But magic doesn't happen overnight.

And it's a lot of work.

And you said, well, you've been doing this almost five years now.

Yeah, that's right.

Yeah.

And that's five years next month, yeah.

That's a lot.

And that's a long time.

And that's a lot of work.

That's a lot of investment.

I mean, you're talking about investing

and then trying to figure out, OK, now we've got to sell it.

We've got to make some money.

We're running a business.

But did you actually ever think you'd

be saving the world from angry junior tennis players?

We want this here from a social point of view.

Because like Bobby said, you're just

making the world a happier place.

I don't think that was in your mission statement

when you started, right?

No, it wasn't.

I mean, I think our mission's always

been that we want to bring the pro experience to the players.

But I don't think LionCalling was really part of it initially.

I think even if I look back to the first pitch,

I did to any rotted.

That wasn't actually part of it at all.

It was just like, hey, we're going to bring this really

cool professional quality data to your game.

And it was all about the stats, actually.

And then what happened was we released the product

because you need video to get the stats.

We said, let's also show you video highlights of your game

and remove the dead time.

And then that actually quickly became the most popular feature.

And so it was actually the highlights that

became the most popular thing.

And then just kind of naturally, as the AI got more accurate,

as our algorithms got better, at a certain point,

we like surpassed human accuracy for the LionCalling.

And then we're like, oh, shoot.

We could solve the biggest problem in the sport,

which is LionCalling.

So it was something that happened later.

It wasn't necessary, something we were trying to do

from the get-go.

Because frankly, I didn't think it would necessarily

be possible.

Even myself, I was just a little bit conservative

about it.

I was like, it'd be cool if we could solve LionCalling.

But I don't think that's really that realistic right now.

So I am amazed that we were able to do it with just one phone.

But the hardware has gotten so good.

Our AI has gotten really good.

Our team has just innovated a lot there.

And so it's finally here.

It's pretty crazy to think about.

And that's the biggest difference, because you've got one camera.

Well, a phone with maybe multiple cameras.

But one one one one one one.

One view point of a camera.

Where on tour they've got, what did I hear?

1.30 cameras or something crazy?

Yeah.

Well, I think Hawkeyes probably like 10 cameras.

But pretty much every other solution out there.

And I won't try to drop any names to give them for advertising.

But if you can Google search and see

as competitors, but they all require at least two cameras pretty much.

So, so the vision is the only system that requires just one.

And we actually got a patent granted for that in February.

It was a--

Took many years to get to that.

But we got that granted.

And it's basically our single camera solution

for tracking objects in 3D.

It actually applies to any sport.

But obviously we're focused on tennis right now.

And so yeah, so it's one of a kind, I guess.

Pun on intended.

And like, there haven't really been any other solutions yet.

And so I think that always will make us the most affordable solution

and the most scalable one.

And I mean, another funny story, actually,

about that was we-- there was a match on this weekend

where we had to move from court five to court three

because of somebody else had court five for some reason.

I guess the scheduling issue.

And so we had to take the phone off and put it on a different court.

And it took like 30 seconds.

And the so-called team was so surprised.

They were like, I love how we had to make a last minute change

to the player scheduling and court assignment.

And we didn't need a screwdriver to do that.

They were just so blown away how easy it was

to just move to a different court.

So I think that just speaks to how scalable this is going to be.

And I think as long as we just train the officials

and the staff members of the USDA,

then you could imagine this just scaling out

to every federation in the world eventually.

So it's kind of just like the path is there now.

And we just have to execute on it.

Oh, there's the fun part.

Now we actually have to go do it.

Right?

Because then we're Bobby jumps in.

He starts asking all the questions like, OK, well, wait a minute.

How do we actually get it done?

So Bobby, I know you've probably got 1,000 questions.

Well, I've been triggered numerous times.

I've heard Tesla, Apple.

I'm like, all right, shareholders, shareholders,

and Kelly more.

So I'm loving this from an Apple perspective.

I see a lot of product going off the shelves.

I want to learn more whether or not I'm ever going

to get autonomous driving out of Elon.

So we'll have to do that off the air.

He's been in you like everybody else

seems to be leaving him right now.

But when did we talk the first time?

When did we speak with swing vision first?

It was about two years ago.

Three years ago.

That immediately I was going to jump in just the fact

that the line calling was now actually part of swing vision

where when we spoke the first time, it was, yes, something

we're doing.

Yes, it's 90% accurate.

Yes, even at 90%.

It's more accurate.

But we don't use it.

Because it was not where we wanted to be.

So when you set that up, media is like, well,

there's a huge change.

Just the way it's being presented right away, which is fantastic.

So now at the tournament, did he?

I know one of things is always that at our level,

people would have to agree on whether the camera would be in play.

Did the tournament say this is the way we're doing it?

You have no choice?

Yeah, exactly.

So they said that, you know, if you don't want to use a system,

like don't come and play basically, they didn't say it like that.

But that was essentially the philosophy.

And so we have a partnership with SoCal for at least eight

events this year, our next ones in June.

It's the junior sectional.

So that's going to be a really big one.

We're going to have 16 courts there.

And it's the same kind of thing.

So this is the system we're going to use.

The decision that happens is the final result.

So you can't even ask a roaming on pyre like, hey, what do you think?

Let's override the system.

You're not allowed to do that because you just

don't want to slow down the game.

Then it defeats the purpose.

SoCal was very adamant about that.

This needs to be the final decision.

Even if it might make a mistake once in a while,

we need to be consistent about it at least.

Because then otherwise you get into a slip really slope.

And it's like, OK, well then, hey, someone in the fans,

saw it out or the parents saw it out or whatever.

It's just, you know, so you want to avoid that.

And so yeah, I think they did a really great job

with that communication.

And I think the players just had to accept it.

And there was maybe one or two calls where they were like,

I don't know if that was really right.

But it's like ultimately it is objective at least.

And it's not going to bias towards any one player or another.

And so I think for the most part, you know,

players felt very comfortable and confident with that approach.

And I know I just handed it back to Bobby.

But in the backhand, I just sent you a contract for eight

events here in Atlanta.

So let's take a look at that when we're done here.

But let's do it.

Yeah, that is a good book is what I'm hearing and all of that

is, OK, what facility actually

has the Wi-Fi capability to do this?

That's what I heard.

I was like, this is a problem in Windom here,

because our Wi-Fi is horrendous.

So that might be the impetus to do better if I could sit there.

You're going to get better line calls.

I think that would be a great way to swing the tennis

committee into improving our technology a little bit.

So yeah, that is of interest.

And so when's your next one?

When is the next--

and how old were the kids at this tournament?

I'm sorry.

Yeah, they were mostly high school age, I would say.

A few of them were seniors about to go in the fall,

and they were going to go play D1 somewhere.

So they're hit and big.

Yeah, they're hit.

Yeah.

Some of those serves, I've never had a serve that fast before.

Never.

You know?

This is a full-grown person hitting a serve.

So we're getting to the high level.

That's great right away.

Have we done anything of spoken to Lake Nona?

Anything coming to Florida?

We are speaking with Lake Nona.

It's a little bit different with them

because I think they would probably prefer more

of a permanent solution, where it's always there.

And so we haven't really built that.

We are thinking about building something that's more

permanent, but I think that's at least today the beauty

of swing vision is that it's not permanent, right?

But I think there is a world where that is helpful to have,

especially at a facility where you have a lot of members.

You don't want everybody to keep putting their swing

stick up and taking it down.

And next person comes on the court and puts it up again.

It's like, let's just cut that out.

And so I think there's an opportunity for that.

And if and when we do build a permanent solution,

I think Lake Nona would be super interested

because I know they have another solution, which

they haven't been totally happy with.

So I think there's an opportunity for us there.

But yeah, and in terms of the next event,

it's the junior sectionals in SoCal, which is--

we're going to be out there the June 8th weekend,

and then the following weekend as well.

So we're going to be there two weekends in a row

because it's such a big event.

And it's like singles, doubles.

You're going to have like 14, 16, 18s,

all different age.

It's probably even 12s, honestly.

So it's just the whole gamut, which

has been really nice to see that we're

able to help everybody improve and experience.

So I don't want to-- and I just don't want it,

because I'm going to put my coach hat on now.

And because you keep saying, and I want to agree with you,

but I do disagree to a point that I think analytics are

terribly underused in tennis.

I think from a sports standpoint,

tennis is behind in the use of analytics.

So I love, as a coach, anything that

is going to ease the introduction into analytics.

I mean, I can say it to him 10,000 times

a blue in the face.

I'm looking forward to saying here, this is a me speaking.

This is the computer telling you what I've been telling you.

So I think just the ease of getting

analytics to people's ads is going to tremendously help

the game.

Help coaches.

I mean, you know, again, just making your life easier.

Now we know there's no problem.

There's no longer debate about the problem.

It's here.

We have empirical data.

There's an issue.

What are we going to do to correct it?

So that is equally as exciting from the coaching perspective.

Yeah, definitely.

I think that's resonated a lot with coaches.

And I think that's probably opportunity for improvement

for us, which is like we kind of show almost too much data,

which I think sometimes can be overwhelming for players.

But I think coaches love it.

They love digging into all the stats and the heat maps

and all the cool features that we have there.

So I think it's kind of trying to find a way

to bridge it a little bit and summarize it in a way

so that players can understand it,

but then still provide the depth for a coach

who really wants to get deep in the weeds.

And the coach can be the one to kind of summarize it

and communicate the feedback.

So yeah, it's really exciting.

And we have a lot of stuff that's going

to be built this year for coaches.

So yeah, it's been a market that we've

been wanting to address more.

But we just had our hands full with the players.

So that's been the primary focus of the product.

But now we're shifting to events.

And then kind of second half of the year

will big focus will be coaches for the first time for us.

So lots of new things coming there.

Yeah, I think that's awesome.

But what they can see it, visualization is such a big thing.

I can tell them I can walk on the court.

If they can see themselves, look, if you would have followed

the ball and moved too feet to your right,

that's an easy volley as opposed to a volley

you're reaching for.

Again, I think it's just going to clue in.

And the great part about the evolution of technology,

everybody's in that place now.

It's not a reach anymore.

We always have our phone in our hands.

We're always looking for answers on our phone.

OK, let's look.

So I could help Lake Known Out put an iPhone on the court.

And they'll be fine.

This way they don't have to worry about it.

You put a little box around it,

protect it from the sun, and your cover.

So we can get around these things.

But yeah, I think from the coaching standpoint,

fantastic.

Looking forward to that as well.

First round, how do we get it here?

I mean, we got some events coming.

We could break up.

I just kind of pause.

I'm like, all right.

So but there, I can go like nine different ways.

I'm just going to pick up which is--

I'm looking down.

I'm saying, OK, so my next big question there

is from a social point of view,

how are we convincing Atlanta for our audience?

You're going to do well in the high level players,

the tournaments, the statistics, the coaches.

But really where we would love to see it also

is a lot of our audience, which is that social player.

It is that 3.0, 3.5, 4.0 player that goes out.

And maybe that was one of your initial targets as well.

It seems like it was just the guy who had an iPhone

and an Apple watch who didn't want to argue about line calls

during his tennis match.

And it's just going out to be able to do that thing.

I'll skip to the only thing really

that I was pushing for a couple of years ago

is where are you guys with streaming at this point?

Can I plug it?

Let's say we magically have great Wi-Fi all the time, right?

Where are we that says, OK, I can now then stream.

Let's say my wife's at home and she wants to watch,

but she's not there.

Is it possible to hit that live feed button as well?

Because I'm wondering if that brings a bit

of the social nature to it beyond just all the cool statistics

and highlights that you've already do.

Yeah, definitely.

We do have a streaming product actually now in the platform.

And it's primarily for colleges, because the costs for us

have been a little bit high.

I think we still need to get the cost down

to make it like a wider consumer product.

But we do have several colleges that use

Swing Vision for streaming.

And so we have about 100 teams that use Swing Vision in general

for analytics and video analysis.

But we have a small handful that are now using it for streaming.

And it's all just within the same app.

And it's just like another setting.

And as you said, as long as you have good Wi-Fi,

then it will work.

And it will even show you the score on the stream

if you're keeping score with another device.

So yeah, we haven't opened it up to consumers yet,

but I mean, it'd be great to chat with you more about that.

I mean, I think there have been some clubs

that have been interested in that as well.

So yeah, I mean, that is our long-term vision, which is, again,

it's like the mission of the companies

to bring the professional experience, right?

So if you think about 10 years from now,

if you're playing tennis, you should expect

that it will be streamed.

People who are watching it will look like a broadcast quality

match to them.

The production will look so good.

It will-- you might even have different camera angles

and slow motion replays.

Even with just one camera, we might

be able to synthetically create that with, like,

a generative AI.

You might be able to have, like, John McEnter

was commentary on your match.

I mean, you can just add--

You can just add the magic of, like, where

this is going to go, right?

So I think that's really the vision for us

is, like, let's try to bring everything

that you see the professional experience

and bring that to everybody who is amateur.

And so I do think the streaming and all this

is going to become the norm.

But I think we're still a bit away on the cost side

to just making that more efficient.

But once you can get that a lot lower cost,

then I think it becomes very exciting.

I think a lot more players will want to stream their matches.

But yeah, then I can think going to your other question

about the social players.

I'd say, if you look at our customer base,

there's almost two categories.

And it's pretty much what you said.

So you have, like, the 4.5 to 5.0 plus type of player

who's, like, really using it for video analysis

or watching back their technique.

They're looking at the shots they missed

and trying to understand, like, what to improve.

And then you have the social players who don't really

look at the stats at all other than maybe, like, speed,

because everybody loves looking at their speed

that they're stunned.

But they're really just using it for highlights.

And so they'll, like, bookmark their favorite rallies.

They'll share it with their friends over, like, text message

or post it on Instagram.

We have a lot of people who post, like, highlights on Instagram.

And if you go to our Instagram page,

you'll see, like, it's just all users

around the world sharing their highlights.

So I think that's become a very fun part

about the social component.

And I think that's where most social players

would get the most value.

It's less so about the data.

And it's just more, like, a way to rewatch

and relive those memories that you had on the court.

And you can share with people who maybe weren't able to come

to the court, friends and family.

You just kick back and, like, watch on the TV.

Like, I do that all the time.

I'll play a match.

And then there are some fun points.

If I go see my parents in another weekend,

I'll just show them, like, we'll just watch on the TV

with their play.

And so, you know, things like that.

It's just like a fun way to relive the moments, I think,

which is also, you know, pretty good value.

Yeah.

And I can only imagine how many parents, grandparents,

you bring the kids and you say, you know what?

Yeah, I didn't get to go see the tournament.

But we've got the whole tournament here in five minutes.

And all the fun-- and here's some of our favorite things.

I mean, I can only imagine want to watch my own grandkids

play in turn-- like, we didn't have that when we were playing

tournaments as kids.

I mean, somebody showed up with the big camera on their shoulder

and tried to video somebody's match.

I think you also weren't allowed to do that.

But it was such a difficult thing to accomplish then.

And now, not only are you capable of giving me this stick,

which I'm very happy with, by the way.

I-- you hang it up there.

It's done.

It's ready to go.

And then it magically does it all.

And that's what's interesting to me,

because there are other products out there

that I got to hit in-- I can press it in manually and do all the math.

And that gives me maybe deeper statistics,

because there's more, because I got to--

I'm putting in more information.

But you just-- I get off the court, and it's done.

It's just fantastic.

And I think, besides saving the planet from bad line calls

and fights, I think it's also the idea

that we're getting together, as Bobby said.

And we're just a happier place.

I mean, Bobby and I talk about trying to do--

we want to do a shot of the week and some fun things

would go to this.

There's more social tennis going on here in Atlanta

than any single place in the world.

And we should be able to share that.

And we should be, ah, I hit the great shot.

And I'm all excited.

But then I still go back to Bobby's coaching hat, who says,

yeah, but I'm still going to walk up to that player and say,

and say, hey, by the way, I was right.

You're at 13% and that's too low.

I actually haven't there.

I'm sure Bobby, that's where you're used to as much as you can.

But I think they're going to improve so much more, too,

because as we always say, the bad part about starting later

in life, you just don't get the reps.

You don't get the visualization.

You're myopic.

You're watching the ball travel.

You're not seeing everything that's going on behind you.

If you're spending time with for whatever reason,

it's just cool.

And I want to watch a good highlight.

That's getting you more exposure.

Unknowingly, unwillingly.

You know, I'm waiting.

You're just getting immersed in it.

So I think it's just going to help

and improve everybody's level of play just

because you get more theoretical reps.

Yeah, I think so.

I mean, that's a good point.

I think the more just recording yourself

becomes part of the times culture, then people

will naturally start to do that.

And then, as you said, even if you're just looking at your highlights,

you'll slowly start to pick out little details.

Like, oh, man, my footwork was so bad on that point.

Or whatever it is.

And then that's just all going to reinforce how you need

to improve your game.

And then you'll start to get a little bit more technical

and strategic about it.

And I think that's sort of the journey

everybody I think goes on with swing vision.

It's like the more you record, the more you revere yourself.

You start to realize, oh, wow.

I can actually improve that.

Or my toss is really bad here or whatever it is.

You can just see all these little things.

And before you know, it's like the fastest way to improve

is just to watch yourself play within two minutes.

And the great part about technology

advancements brings you back to showing you

the simple things that you do wrong that create a problem.

Whether you said whether you're short or step,

you didn't extend far enough on your ball toss.

It's the simple things that the pros do better

than everybody else, which allowed them

to continue to be experimental and go to a whole other place.

Everybody wants to peel off my swing harder

if I do this.

So look at the picture.

You were falling over.

That's not a good sign.

Yeah, we want to be on balance.

Forget about everything else.

Start there.

Start with the ground.

So yeah, I said it.

And you guys are a lot younger.

And we go through this all the time that I laugh.

I said, OK, when I started, but it was a super eight.

And it was a big selling point.

Yeah, they'd be able to get quite a few years.

We videotape you and we go into the room and watch

and talk about quality being horrendous and everything else.

You did learn.

You watch personally, you look forward to it

because you wanted to do what you looked like.

And then you sit there and go, oh, God, did I really do that?

Yeah, I realized.

So anytime you see it, it's reinforcement.

And the more often you see it and considering the hand,

the phone is attached to everybody's hand.

To begin with, it's a no brainer.

And body over.

I remember that video time frame

because it also cost $60.

And that was an intolerable amount of money.

Like, nobody had that much money to pay for video.

$60 was so much money back then.

I don't know if I can afford that.

Yeah, the last thing that you had to pay somebody

to do the video.

And you know, like that, it became a whole different level

of lesson.

And I mean, in that 20 years ago, there

was a guy in Atlanta that's how he made his living.

He videotape.

And now, as much as you wanted, it is the coach.

It is a little cost prohibitive now.

Just here.

We'll go through it.

And if the coach is smart, it's a skulls fashion.

Hey, you know, you were a couple minutes with chalkboard.

15 minutes.

It's a lesson.

And you know, it's quick because you know,

they're going to want to do it more

than they're going to want to listen.

So like said, coach chops it up.

This is what you're looking for your back in.

All right, this is what we're going to work on today.

Boom.

It's just going to simplify everybody's life.

Agreed.

And so you're going to have a different experience

in California, because California and Georgia,

we both speak English, but we're basically different countries.

And it was just very different.

And Atlanta being very unique with its tennis coach culture

as well.

But there, I don't know what your experience is going

to a coach and say, hey, we've got this great tool.

You should spend money on it.

It's a value ad for your coaching abilities.

Here, we always have trouble convincing the coaches

to spend money on the extra things.

Because it's just hard.

I mean, we've got plenty of coaches here

that don't have the club that also pays for it.

And you don't get to walk in and say, you know,

I've got my coaching job.

Here are your new shoes and your collared shirt.

And here's your swing vision account.

Like, we just don't always have that.

So I got to come up with my 180 bucks a month or whatever.

Sorry, a year.

And that's one of my favorite things.

But it's really not that expensive.

And then I look back at the intolerable amount of money

that it was for one hour of video back in the day.

This is as much as you want within your phone

to be able to get it done.

And there are going to be some costs.

Maybe it need to upgrade your phone, whatever it is.

But in that case, do you have good response

from the coaches, from a cost point of view,

and for them bringing it in and saying, yes,

we can integrate this into what we're doing?

Yeah.

So I think the biggest hurdle actually

has been probably the hardware.

Because it's like a lot of coaches,

typically aren't as like hard income as like the players.

And so they may not necessarily have the latest iPhone.

They might have an Android device instead,

because that's a lot more affordable.

We're not on Android yet.

Hopefully we'll get there next year.

But you know, so I think like--

It's always--

[INTERPOSING VOICES]

--the favorite Apple.

We're Apple.

[LAUGHTER]

Bobby is not going to look on your flip phone.

She's not going to look on your flip phone.

But I think that's honestly been the bigger barrier.

It's like, oh, I've got to upgrade my device.

I don't really upgrade my device.

I mainly use my phone to just make calls.

Why do I got to get a whole new phone?

So I think for a lot of coaches, it's like a big change.

Obviously, if you feel like a younger coach just

coming out of college and stuff, that's not

an issue you probably already have an iPhone.

But I think the older coaches, it's

always a bit of a friction point for them.

But yeah, I think the cost of this subscription,

like you said, it's basically $15 a month, which--

And you were saying 20 years ago there

was a guy who was doing it for $60.

I remember when we first launched

a $15 subscription version back in 2019, even at that time,

there were guys here in California that

would go out with GoPros and they'd

record matches at USTA events, $40 a match.

And it's nothing special.

It's just the full match.

You have to play through all the dead time.

And with Swing Vision, it just literally saves you time.

And it's $15 a month for as many matches as you want,

effectively.

I mean, it's just insane.

It's less than a dollar a match if you do the math.

So it's just like the cost has come down so much now.

And it's so much more accessible.

So I think like, yeah, the cost should really

be like a no-brainer for a coach.

I would think, but I think I could see how changing device,

changing platforms could be a much bigger decision,

maybe an emotional decision for some people.

But I think we'll get there eventually.

And then I think the thing that's really exciting, which

I was kind of looting to, is we're

going to start building some new features for coaching

that are going to help coaches actually earn more.

And the biggest opportunity we see there

is remote coaching.

So having the ability to record a match with Syngvision

and then have a coach anywhere in the world

provide feedback for you remotely.

And so I think that would be an excellent opportunity

for coaches to actually be able to get more business.

Because you're not just restricted to where you live.

You can literally coach anybody in the world.

And so I think as these kinds of things get built,

then it starts to become even more of a no-brainer for coaches

to actually use the service.

And then if they're using it for remote coaching,

they might start to get more familiar with the product.

Maybe they'll start using it for in-person lessons as well.

Hopefully you would think at that point.

So I think all of that should help.

But I think part of it's also just like we've really catered

a lot of the product experience to players.

And there's a lot of features that we just haven't made yet,

which I know that coaches won.

But we just haven't been able to prioritize.

But I think now we're going to be focusing

on this remote coaching functionality

and helping coaches earn more money and all that.

Then I think we'll be able to slowly add in more features

that are helpful to them.

And that helps so much because you're not competing

with the coaches.

There are plenty of other apps we'll call them.

Only have other solutions out there that are saying,

well, we can do your coaching for you.

We have your AI coach.

And the coach said, that's not good for me

because I don't want to get replaced by our robot.

The coaches don't want to feel threatened

by the thing that's helping them.

For sure.

And in this case, I think of it Bobby mentioned earlier,

it was what happens when it rains.

Well, you know what?

You've got three matches we haven't gone through yet.

You're still coming to your lesson.

Let's go sit down.

Let's go through it all.

And there's your lesson.

So there's your rain out solution.

Is we also can go through the matches we haven't gone through.

But then also on a weekend where if I can't be one

of my players tournaments and you've got that streaming option,

I'm there.

I mean, I don't want to say I can text them and be like,

no, keep serving to the backhand.

You know what, if you're going to check it on the changeovers,

but I'll say it because if I'm watching in real time,

how nice would that be?

I've got all 10 of my kids up here on the screen.

And I'm watching everybody play on their swing visions,

you know, feed that's coming in.

I think it's, I mean, obviously it's got legs

because you guys are doing it.

But we've just been excited about it for a couple of years.

So we're looking forward to what's next, of course.

And I'm going to prove that I probably haven't done

as much homework as I should as far as the pricing plan.

But that is, right now where you're targeting,

it's basically per individual.

Yes.

That's the way it's very good.

Because I mean, and I said this from day one,

I would love to see, you know, figure out on your side

where you maximize your money just a different way.

How does the club pay for the majority of it

and then through add-ons?

Because, you know, and how does it work?

If you know, if I have it, does my player have to have,

you know, if they obviously have to have it,

how did they communicate with me?

That's the other thing that I saw from day one, okay.

How do we simplify the process?

Right.

Yeah, yeah.

So that's something we were trying to figure out with clubs.

I think, especially with this like the permanent model

that we're looking into, it seems like a lot of clubs

are very interested in that.

And most of the clubs are talking to you,

are interested in just baking it into like the membership

of the club.

Exactly.

All the pros would get access to it.

It's already on every court.

So I think like that's the simplest solution probably.

And then, yeah, I mean, today if you're like a coach

that doesn't coach out of a club,

necessarily, you're just doing private lessons

at, you know, wherever park you go to,

then I think it's a little bit more complicated.

But you can still get a subscription

for yourself as a coach.

And you could technically just do the same thing.

Like, we give you 30 hours of recording a month.

So you could record all your lessons

if you wanted to.

It doesn't matter if there's like other players in it.

You can even tag them in it.

The main restriction that will happen is for the players.

And so like on their side, you know, unless they subscribe,

they're going to kind of be capped to two hours a month

of their lessons, essentially.

But you know, if they want to see more footage than that,

then they can just upgrade.

But you as a coach could certainly record as much

as you want it within your limits.

And you could show them that from your phone and all that.

So like you can still get a lot of the benefits out of it.

But yeah, it is still like a little bit weird

that there's like different subscriptions and stuff.

So I think probably more opportunities to improve that

still and make it more simple, as you said.

Yeah, I mean, that was, I mean,

and I know it's always tough.

I went through this with with courts was coming on.

And what their vision of how to pay when I was like, no.

And I won that argument, thank please.

Because I was like, you know, that's if he stands

that you don't think it's much.

But when it comes to doing 5,000 reservations a month,

that's a lot more than they're, you know, they're not paying for it.

So I just, I was going to the deepest pockets.

There's the other, there's the law background.

Go through the guy who's got the most money.

Well, I want to get to the club.

There's like you said, most likely to pay it.

And they can raise their dues $10, $20 a year.

Nobody knows any difference.

And I could have sneezed over it.

If you're going to get something as dynamic as this.

So that's that has always been, you know,

how do we simplify the presentation?

So that said, and because we're going to go, you know,

we said two years ago, I'm ready to go.

I've had my people continue to ask me, I said,

I'm talking to them today.

What do we, what's the, what do they do to sign up?

And how do we get this thing going for you?

Yeah.

So I mean, the best way to sign up is going to be with your referral

code.

So I assume you guys will probably share that in the notes

somewhere.

But I think that will give them a free swing stick, actually.

So, you know, there's a pro subscription that we have,

which gives you, like I said, 30 hours a month of recording,

lifetime cloud storage.

So your matches are there forever.

Like you can go back 10 years.

Your matches will still be there if you want to watch them.

So that's all included in the subscription.

That's a $180 a year effectively $15 a month.

And so if you sign up for that, you get the free swing stick

if they use your link.

And there's also a 45 day like money back guarantee.

So if you're not happy with the product at all,

you can just return it back to us, get everything back.

We don't want to charge you if you don't get value out

of the product.

So yeah, so that's pretty much the fastest way to get it.

And the app itself, you can download later

after you sign up, but it's free to download

and works on any iPhone, like iPhone 11 or newer.

As long as you're on the latest iOS, you can get it.

Bobby, we got to get this at Windermere for sure.

And I was even thinking about it.

I'm like, man, how much fun would it be to get this going everywhere?

And like we said, we've been talking to swing vision.

We've been talking to you guys off and on for the last couple of years.

Just where does it plug in right?

When are we ready for you?

And when are you ready for us?

And say, OK, how do we get this here at Lana that says,

this is just really good for tennis.

Aside, even if it was almost too expensive, which it's not.

Like even if the cost was a problem, we could complain about that,

but we can't.

This is, it's too affordable to not be able to plug this in

and helping the line calls with the highlights.

With, like I said, when streaming, we can figure that out

because we'd love to make that the highlights beyond just your Instagram page.

We want to be able to share it within Atlanta in general.

Again, with with Alta, USDA and T2 and all the things going on here,

I think it would be phenomenal.

I think people would really enjoy it.

I think people would bring people into the sport and really help tennis in general.

And that's what go tennis.

That's what we're doing here in the podcast.

That's why we like talking to guys like you, Swapnil.

Because we see that it's about using our own skills.

Mine isn't statistics, but yours is.

So using your own skills to be able to help tennis in general.

Or is probably not like to say, make tennis better than it already is.

Yeah.

Definitely.

So definitely, I've got more about that.

I mean, yeah, definitely would love to just have everybody using it at the

Atlanta community.

I mean, that'd be amazing.

Yeah, we'll definitely figure that out.

And you're right.

We'll stick the link in the show notes and let everybody know about the referral code.

And I can vouch for that swing stick that I wasn't sure.

I mean, it's a hundred dollars stick.

Come on, guys.

I can put a cell phone on a broomstick.

What are you guys doing?

And when I opened it, I actually had our 18-month old son open it.

We'll video and we're going to put that on someone.

I got it out like this thing is awesome.

Like this is fantastic.

Like, yes.

So getting that free, that's an offer.

I appreciate that.

So Bobby, I'll start my ending with you and say, you got anything else for Swope No?

Or should I hit him with King of Tennis?

Hit him.

Okay.

Swope No.

Before I hit you with King of Tennis, anything else we forgot to mention?

No, I think that was covered a lot there.

That was great.

Okay.

So as you know is coming and I assume you put a little bit of thought into it, but we always

asked this King of Tennis question where whether it's for the whole universe or just Southern

California, just Northern California, anywhere in the world, any length of time, if you were

King of Tennis, whether it's professional, amateur, anything, you were King of Tennis

from your point of view, is there anything you would do or change?

Well, I mean, I'll give two answers on to that, I guess.

The first one is kind of the obvious one, which is I would want every match to be recorded

and streamed with Swing Vision.

Like that would, I would just want that to happen right away, especially at the competition

level.

Yeah.

But I just think like it's just so fun to have the line calling and I just think like I wish

everyone could have this.

So that's, that would be like the one thing I would change.

I think the second one is probably more from as a fan and kind of has to do more with

the pro tennis.

I feel like it's very fragmented in terms of like, where do you watch, which tournament

and all that?

It was all just like one streaming service that just had every single match, you know,

everywhere.

And like I could just see that.

And it was also more customized like, you know, so I've always seen the same angle.

Like maybe I want to see it from the court level angle or I want to always see like Carlos,

regardless of which side he's on, I want to see just the angle from that side.

Like a more customized viewing experience, but also more consolidated viewing experience

because right now you kind of have to go to different streams or like I think Medvedev

suggested one time you have to go find a legal stream online.

So it's just like such a mess right now.

I feel like and I think that would be so much better for the fans if it was all consolidated.

And you had like college tennis in the same product too.

I don't know.

Like I just think it'd be super cool to have this like one place to like see everything

that related to tents, related to the sport.

So you know, I don't know how practical that is, but I just feel like from a fan perspective

that would be amazing.

The practicality isn't relevant in your kid.

That's true.

You can do whatever you want.

I'm trying to figure out how to push back Bobby because it's not like the question isn't

how do you do it because it's just more cameras and figuring out the feeds.

I remember back in the day when ESPN started doing their ESPN 3 and all the extra feeds and

it was all free because it didn't really work.

But that's why they did it.

But I loved it.

Oh, I got this weird angle.

I can watch court 17.

And I don't have to watch this, you know, other match that I don't want to watch.

And I can watch the guy that I like or the girl that I want to watch whatever it is.

And I think that's a good target.

So I'm going to have fun thing to say, you know what, let's personalize the viewing experience.

You know, does everything then have to go through tennis channel tennis.com ATP?

Like how does that work?

You know, we ended with some sort of torrent system that we've got to pay.

You know what?

I think between the three of us, we should be able to figure this one out.

Well, you know, depending the conversations of the week, if the thought is getting

involved, it might be a lot closer to being reality than you think.

If you all of a sudden have a leak, then you have a commissioner and you say, this is

the way we're going to do.

I got to think that obviously the technology of customizing your viewing experience already

exists.

That's just a matter of making it consumer, you know, presenting the consumer.

But I got to think that's there already.

So that's not that big a deal.

I think that's an awesome idea.

How much fun, you know, even you get to watch, you know, just spend more time concentrating

on who your favorite player is.

So that's an absolute no-brainer.

And again, if you get it all into one house, I think everything else gets a lot easier where

you're not worrying about just NBC at the same technology or making the same commitment as

ESPN.

Yeah, it's, Ted has kind of won't be the place.

And again, part of it is most of it is, let's be honest, business and the antiquated way

in which it's approached with rights fees and small picture in the cable things.

I mean, Ted thinks they're the same as golf.

So they should get 325 on household instead of 10 cents.

I mean, there's so much that goes beyond behind it.

It's terrible because I'm a big believer given to the people to pay extra.

I think that's been proven with Apple.

You know, everybody told, oh, they have no new technology yet.

Services goes up 20% a quarter.

Well, they're doing something, guys, to keep their business and to expand their bottom

line.

Yeah.

And I think that's, it may be a little more work.

You got to be a little more creative that way, but it's here.

And it's unfortunate.

We're stuck with these models, especially with these all these television companies, Disney

being one of them just trying to figure out what to do with these rights agreements that

are seemingly bankrupting themselves.

Yeah.

I like it.

Yeah.

The go tennis stream is going to have, we're bringing it to you coming in 2029 or so.

We don't want to be here.

I love that.

I love the topic.

You heard it here first.

It was coming.

But, no, I appreciate your time.

I really do.

This has been a lot of fun.

Bobby is always, thank you so much.

And this team was talking about our problem is driving.

Was that it?

This team we're not going to talk about our time is driving.

That's the other podcast.

Oh, this is the Shaun and Bobby podcast.

That's the Bobby and Shaun podcast.

Different thing.

Different thing.

All right.

Different thing.

Oh, yeah.

We'll follow up next time.

We'll see what we can do.

We're sure.

That sounds good.

Thank you so much for having me.

This is super fun.

Well, there you have it.

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And with that, we're out.

See you next time.

Bye.

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