The 2019th South East Asian (SEA) Games held in Philippines came to a close, rounding off the final major sporting event of the year for countries in the region, as all eyes are set on the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics next year.
Scheduled to be held from July 24th to August 9th, 2020, this will be the second time Japan is hosting the Summer Olympics after 1964. But things definitely look to be very different. For several decades, the Japanese have poised themselves as a people who readily embrace the future and a high-technological lifestyle. This culture is clearly being translated in the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics, which gives us a peek into the future of SportsTech.
Let us take a look at some unique features we will be seeing at the major sporting event, that have commentators claiming how the Tokyo 2020 Games is likely to be the most innovative Games ever:
Japan is internationally recognized as the expert and leader in the field of robotics, with highly competitive research, development and applied technologies. Partnering the International Olympic Committee, Toyota brings to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics robots that are aimed at improving the efficiency and accessibility of the Games. To reduce the amount of time and physical manpower required to retrieve objects during throw events such as javelins, hammers and discuses, the Field Support Robot (FSR) , a remote-controlled vehicle powered by artificial intelligence (AI), uses cameras and sensors to determine the most optimum route to travel whilst avoiding obstacles.
The Human Support Robot (HSR) and Delivery Support Robot (DSR) will also be deployed to assist those with accessibility requirements, helping guide spectators to their seats as well as bringing items such as food and drinks to them.
Mascot robots will be on stand-by at sporting venues to welcome guests. The inclusion of facial recognition technology and miniature joint units across each robot allows them to respond with different expressions and display a range of physical movements. Complementing the mascot robots is the T-HR3, a humanoid robot that mimics movements of the mascot robot in a different location and is able to relay images and sounds from competition venues themselves to a different location. This allows visitors to access the atmosphere of the Olympic Stadium or even interact with athletes remotely.
The 2020 Summer Olympics will see a revolution in sports broadcasting. Where flying a whole team across the globe to capture the Games had always meant heavy operating costs for broadcasters and high barriers to entry for smaller broadcasters, advances in cloud computing technology is set to redefine the industry.Back in 2018, Olympic partners Alibaba Cloud and Intel joined the Olympic Broadcasting Services to launch “OBS Cloud”, a broadcasting platform to support content production and delivery workflows involved with the Olympic Games, offering rights-holding broadcasters a cloud-based solution for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.
This means that the traditional need for different broadcasters to build studios, unique remote broadcasting infrastructures outside broadcast units, and establishing network connectivity on a massive scale will be largely reduced. This significantly lowers the costs of having to deploy on site manpower and the set-up of the physical infrastructures and equipment.
With Alibaba Cloud leveraging on its enormous stores of computing power and Intel providing the hardware such as computer vision technology and deep learning algorithms, the two companies have come together to build a 3D Athlete Tracking Technology powered by AI in time for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.
The technology is able to track an athlete’s real-time biochemical data in both training and/ or competition, creating a highly accurate digital model of the athlete’s performance that can be analyzed in many different ways.
For coaches and athletes, this has the potential to become a formidable training tool to enhance training programs. For broadcasters, this can revolutionize the way fans engage and consume content, redefining the audience experience of sporting events through how sports are analyzed, dissected and presented during highlights and replays.
Be it an athlete, a coach, or a fan, the 2020 Games will be an eye-opening and more immersive experience than ever before. 5G platforms, Artificial Intelligence solutions, Virtual Reality, immersive media – these are merely a few of the innovations that will be introduced in the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympics. But it does not end there.
Technology has been slowly but surely transforming the world of sports, with the 2020 Games seeing a massive amount of investment and innovation pouring into the sports technology industry. As one of the largest sporting event that engages and brings together over five billion people globally, the 2020 Summer Olympics will set the stage to unveil how technology would revolutionize the sports industry in the years to come.
2019.12.19 ｜ text by Leia Teo（One&Co）
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