Got game? Ubersense can help

Apr 12, 2013

Startups & Venture Capital

Boston startup helps you hone your game

Taryn Plumb, Special to the Journal

W. Marc Bernsau

When Krishna Ramchandran started playing golf a few years ago, he admits his game was really bad.
He tried using videotapes to capture his form and solicit feedback from instructors, but found the process to be cumbersome.
Finally, when video capabilities became available on cell phones, he began recording his swings, then immediately sending the files off to a coach. 
That idea eventually morphed into Ubersense, a Boston startup with a mobile video analysis app aiming to help athletes improve their game in 30 different sports. The Ubersense app has now been downloaded more than a million times by both novices and professionals, said Ramchandran, who co-founded Ubersense in January 2011 with Amit Jardosh, and now serves as its CEO.
The app allows users to upload, record and share videos, and then analyze and scrutinize their form.
“The idea is to put feedback in practice right on the field,” Ramchandran said. “It closes the feedback loop between you and the coach.”
A participant in the TechStars Boston startup accelerator’s winter 2012 session, Ubersense is backed by $1.1 million from Google Ventures, Atlas Venture, Boston Seed Capital and angel investors Ty Danco and Joe Caruso.
Its namesake app was launched in November 2011, and is free to download, but is currently only available in iOS format. An Android version should be forthcoming in the summer, Ramchandran said.
More than 150 schools and universities, and a number of high-profile coaches and organizations, have implemented Ubersense for training, he said. It’s been widely adopted by PGA professionals, Ramchandran said, and USA Gymnastics and USA Volleyball used it while preparing for the 2012 Olympic games in London.
The company has also partnered with the USA Bobsled and Skeleton Federation as its athletes train for the 2014 games in Sochi, Russia, and is providing content on its app related to swings, drills and lessons from the top female golfers competing in the 2013 Symetra Tour.
“The best coaches and athletes around the world are using the app,” Ramchandran said.
Ultimately, golf, baseball and tennis players and coaches have been the most prominent users, according to Ramchandran.
But newer disciplines have begun using Ubersense, as well – CrossFit coach Aaron Landes, for instance, uses it to help improve form with Olympic lifts such as cleans and jerks.
“These are very form-based movements, so technique is important,” said Landes, a former pitching coach at Harvard University who now co-owns CrossFit Lando in Woburn. “Modeling, or an athlete seeing themselves or another person doing a movement the right or wrong way, is the best way to learn.”
The portability of the app, he said, ultimately allows him to stress technical points during sessions, and helps athletes make adjustments on the fly.
As it evolves, Landes said he’d like to be able to more easily integrate other people’s videos into his own database.
Although Ubersense does have three or four revenue models available, it’s not focused on making money right now, Ramchandran said, but is instead seeking to foster a community of fitness enthusiasts like Landes.
“We’re setting the foundation for this massive community around video improvement in sports,” Ramchandran said.

Original story link.