Vistara, QIC back Australian sports-tech player Vald
US-based growth-stage technology investor Vistara Growth has joined Queensland Investment Corporation in an AUD 36m (USD 25m) round for Vald, an Australian start-up that supplies performance-tracking technology to a host of professional sports teams.
Vald, which originated in 2015 from a research project at Queensland Technology University, will use the proceeds to add 100 staff by year-end and continue its expansion in North America, the source of 50% of its revenue. The company has already completed three acquisitions intended to accelerate its product roadmap.
Vald has developed a series of hardware devices that measure hamstring strength, neuromuscular strength, explosive power, and speed and agility. It also provides software for collecting and tracking performance data and managing training programmes.
Customers include 20 English Premier League (EPL) clubs, 25 National Basketball Association (NBA) teams, 27 National Football League (NFL) teams, 22 Major League Baseball (MLB) teams, over 70 sport governing bodies, and more than 100 universities. It is used to monitor athlete performance, injury, and recovery.
The technology also has broader healthcare applications. Vald already works with the likes of the Mayo Clinic in the US and KSW, a leading musculoskeletal facility in Europe. KSW uses Vald to determine the best treatment plans for patients. Musculoskeletal conditions represent one of the biggest burdens on health systems, costing USD 256bn each year in the US alone.
“Vald’s human measurement technology had been battle tested by the world’s most demanding customers in professional sport and defence organisations. With rapid early adoption in healthcare settings, it was time to prepare for global expansion,” said Noah Shipman, a partner at Vistara, in a statement. He added that Vald is a global leader in its market.
The connection between sport and healthcare is being explored by other Australia-based investors. XT Ventures, which was established last year by Craig Lambert, who previously ran local accelerator Slingshot, uses the sports ecosystem as a proving ground for fitness and wellness technologies that are then taken into the consumer realm.
Lambert told AVCJ earlier this year that XT looks at sport “as a laboratory, like the new NASA,” and the goal was to get wellness data more actively used by mainstream healthcare providers to better manage injury and disease.
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