Swing Catalyst
An application for estimating and analyzing sports performance
Short summary
Client: Initial Force — a Norwegian company that build sports performance software and hardware for golfers and baseball players.
Need: The client already had the basic desktop app and required the dedicated team to work on the new product releases. Later on, they asked us to create the mobile app from scratch.
Challenge: When the client approached us, they already had the hardware used for sports - 3DMotion and Balance sensor plates. We needed to develop an advanced video player and editor that would integrate with the plates for analyzing the data gathered from them.
Solution: Existek provided a dedicated team of engineers who quickly got up to the speed with the available information about the product and started new features development after one week of onboarding.
Impact: Our team helped Initial Force to deliver new features for the customers two times faster than before. The introduction of the mobile companion app further increased customers engagement rate and increased video lessons sales through the built-in store by 170% on average.
Location
Platforms
Core Tech
Team size
Duration
We wanted to expand our ecosystem with two mobile apps and a desktop app based on customer requests. Existek created native applications that integrate with company's cloud services and a desktop solution. The team delivered constant improvement to the project. They were pleasant and flexible to work with. We were really satisfied with the results.
What’s the app for?
Swing Catalyst is an application for sportsmen, golfers, and baseball players in particular. It is a part of the whole training ecosystem developed by Initial Force. The application integrates with balance and pressure plates that help estimate the pressure of both feet, body position, applied force, etc. Sports are not only about the muscles. They are about complicated calculations that Swing Catalyst software helps to perform.
Desktop app
A desktop component of Swing Catalyst software includes an advanced video player integrated with the performance plates, such as 3D Motion and Pressure Boards. Users can replay videos at any speed, compare videos side-by-side, and synchronize them with the data received from the sensor plates. The application also includes a simple calendar with the training schedule.
Mobile app
A mobile application duplicates the desktop app’s functionality but in a less detailed view. So, via a mobile app, users can access the most necessary features on the go - video playback, drawing component, core measurements, training schedule, exercise guides. However, for a more thorough analysis of sports performance, it’s better to use a desktop component.
Core features
Video recordings with KPIs measurement
The application integrates with the existing physical performance plates: balance and pressure boards. They are based on sensors. Swing Catalyst allows recording a video of a sportsman’s actions, and synchronizing them with the performance plates’ data. It shows the pressure on both feet, which affects the position of the upper body, in real-time.
Video playback and side-by-side comparison
If one of your attempts appeared more successful than the others, you may want to see what position your body was in, and what torque value the ball has had. Swing Catalyst provides a useful feature with side-by-side video comparison, playback speed control, and drawing tools for comparing gestures, poses, etc.
Body position control
Force factor, max ball torque, graphs, measurements - all information gathered from the performance plates is available within one tab. You can see visually presented graphs with all physical performance data along with the video playback on the right side of the screen. Control the playback speed to notice even the smallest inaccuracies in your body position.
Learning module
Self-education is essential in each and every field, including sports. However, sometimes it’s not that easy to master new skills without a professional coach by your side. Fortunately, Swing Catalyst includes numerous exercise guides with verbal descriptions and video examples.
Project objective
We needed to create the desktop and native mobile applications for a sports performance software company. Our client’s company has sensor-based pressure and balance plates, ball tracking tools, etc. We needed to create a solution that will display all gathered data in a comprehensible view.
So, basically, we’ve developed a video player that allows replaying video with different speed, zooming in and out, editing video on the go: adding axes, drawing trajectory, etc.
Target market
The main target audience is golf and basketball players, and their instructors. However, the platform is steadily extending, so later on, it will also be useful for other kinds of sport, such as ski jumping, for example.
Challenges
- To synchronize video with the data received from the sensor balance and motion plates
- To create an advanced video editor with all features the players may need to analyze their performance
- To develop three components: two native mobile apps and a desktop app
Collected requirements
- Three applications: two native mobile apps, and a desktop app
- Possibility to draw axes or trajectories on the top of the video to analyze body position and other details
- Synchronization with the existing sensor plates
- Robust performance
Discovery stage
- A UI/UX designer involved producing mockups and wireframes
- Over 20 meetings with a customer
- About 200 hours spent on documentation development
Deliverables
- Accurate project timeline and cost estimation
- A developed project plan including milestones, sprints, and deliverables
Development
Technology
Sportsmen need to have the possibility to see the immediate change in their position or movements, that’s why robust app performance was one of the main requirements for Swing Catalyst.
Desktop development
WPF
WinForms
ASP.NET
#1
IDE - Visual Studio - is used for WPF
400K+
websites use ASP.NET in the USA
Mobile development
swift
java
45B
Java virtual machines globally
750+
organizations use Swift for their projects
Development tools
jira
testFlight
70K+
companies use Jira as a powerful PM tool
15
app demo versions in TestFlight are available to the client
Technologies also used by
Dedicated team
In order to develop a robust SaaS platform, the team brought system flexibility and efficiency into the main focus. The well-thought structure allowed them to reach high scalability, system integrity, and security. .NET application architecture was an excellent solution for component reusability, code sharing, and data systematization.
Provider’s team
report to
Vendor’s PM/CTO
Client’s team
report to
Client’s PM/CTO
A dedicated team has numerous benefits compared to other collaboration models. It is perfect for the development of some separate parts of the product when the client’s team misses some specific skills required for it. It was so in our case.
The main advantage of the dedicated team model is that clients can choose developers specifically with the knowledge they need, but they receive a tight-knit team instead of individual programmers that have never worked together. For this project, we offered a team of 2 mobile and 2 desktop developers and a project manager they report to. Regarding the dedicated developers model, clients highly appreciate that they don’t have to go through the lengthy recruitment process and receive people with great experience in teamwork at once.
Project manager
Mobile developer
Desktop developer
Mobile developer
Desktop developer
How we ensure transparency for the client
During such a complicated development process, it’s important to make sure that a client sees progress and isn’t kept in the dark. For this, we constantly keep in contact with our customer, conduct regular check-ins, and provide app demo versions on the different development stages.
Highlights
Project summary
Exemplary development approach and uncompromised quality
This project was an interesting experience for our team from both software and hardware perspectives. Currently we’re working on a new release that includes fully-functional body tracking system and it is will be ready for release soon. Existek’s team have been working with Initial Force for more than two years. During this time we gradually improved their desktop app with the new features and released two native mobile applications. For this, we offered our client a dedicated team consisting of 5 specialists. By choosing this approach, the customer benefited from the tight-knit team and lots of saved time that would otherwise be spent on the long-lasting recruitment process.
We worked according to the Agile methodology, which helped us deliver the uncompromised results quickly.
Our locations
Warsaw, Poland, 00-645
Bucharest, Romania, 011663
Vinnytsia, Ukraine, 21021
