News

BALTIMORE, June 13, 2022 — Connexa Sports Technologies Inc. is pleased to announce that its wholly owned subsidiary, PlaySight Interactive (www.playsight.com) has entered into three new commercial partnerships in the sport of Pickleball, enhancing the company’s presence in the exciting, high-growth sport after last week’s announcement of a successful beta test of the Slinger Bag Ball Launcher for Pickleball. Through its ‘Watch, Play, Learn’ strategy specific to its core sports, Connexa Sports plans to connect its products, technologies and services together to provide new offerings to core enthusiasts across many sports, including pickleball.

PlaySight has installed its video technology platform at The Pickle Shack (Delaware, Ohio), Chicken N Pickle (Overland Park, Kansas), and The Pickleball Club (Sarasota, Florida). PlaySight is best known for its tennis technology but also powers many other sports, including baseball, softball, soccer, basketball and now pickleball with live streaming and performance video for coaching and player development.

The Pickleball Club:

The Pickleball Club has multiple facilities in development in Florida. Each will have 12 or more indoor pickleball courts, all with PlaySight technology installed. Its first club in the Lakewood Ranch area of Sarasota, Florida is set to open this December, with locations in Port St. Lucie, Bonita Springs, Fort Myers and Venice, Florida to follow. “Our mission is to provide our members an extraordinary amenity-based experience. When we found PlaySight, we knew that the quality of video, the ease of access and ability to enhance our instructional programs would help us fulfill our mission and reinforce our brand positioning as providing the best pickleball experience anywhere,” said CFO Matt Gordon.

“PlaySight will also be an important part of our instructional programs. The pros are excited to have new tools that can help reinforce pickleball education. These include being able to review what just happened in a point or lesson right on the court, or a ‘virtual lesson, where our members can send a pro a segment of game play for review, analysis and comment. With PlaySight we can now literally provide a lesson without using up scarce court inventory,” continued Gordon.

Chicken N Pickle:

Chicken N Pickle currently has six locations with another three planned for later this year. Its unique, indoor/outdoor concept includes a casual, chef-driven restaurant and sports bar that boasts pickleball courts. “We are excited to announce the addition of PlaySight to our pickleball courts. Our state-of-the-art pickleball facilities are home to hundreds of camps and clinics for players of all ages and ability levels and we look forward to offering streaming capability and analytics that can help our teaching pros enhance the experience for everyone who steps foot on our courts,” said Kelli Alldredge, Senior VP of Engagement.

“Chicken N Pickle is currently testing this technology at our Overland Park location and we hope to have it installed on two courts at every location in the future. PlaySight will help everybody, from the beginning pickleball player to the advanced tournament player by providing instant replay and multi-angle technology, pro-level analysis and more. As the nation’s premier pickleball facility, we can’t wait to see our players’ reactions to this technology – the ability to film a lesson and have a pickleball pro break it down in real time is certainly a competitive advantage,” continued Alldredge.

The Pickle Shack:

The Pickle Shack contains six indoor courts with plans to expand to 20 on-site, and officially launched with PlaySight in May at ‘The Rumble,’ a statewide pickleball tournament that it hosted. “Everyone responded positively to the quality of the video, and our members are looking forward to recording and reviewing their matches,” said owner Dave Ganim. “We will also use PlaySight in our new teaching academy to help teach the sport of pickleball to our students. We are also excited about the ability to live stream to our bar area TVs.”

“It is great to see the growth we are seeing in pickleball across the Connexa Sports portfolio,” said Connexa Sports CEO Mike Ballardie. “PlaySight proved its technology in tennis, and pickleball has many of the same needs. The partnerships will bring us to all levels of the sport, from casual new players to high performance pros. We look forward to creating further integrations with the Slinger Bag and other technologies in development.”