National Football League and Amazon Web Services Expand Partnership to Further Shape the Future of Football

Rhea-AI Summary

The National Football League (NFL) and Amazon Web Services (AWS) have extended their partnership, focusing on innovation through AI and machine learning. Key highlights include:

1. Introduction of a new AI-powered Next Gen Stat called Tackle Probability.

2. Implementation of generative AI tools at NFL Media to boost operational efficiency.

3. Continued development of the Digital Athlete tool for injury prevention and rule changes.

4. Enhancements to fan engagement through data-driven insights and personalized experiences.

5. Utilization of AWS for NFL Films' digital archive and NFL+ infrastructure.

This partnership aims to shape the future of football by leveraging advanced technologies across various aspects of the game and fan experience.

Positive

• Extended partnership with AWS, a leader in cloud computing and AI technologies
• Introduction of new AI-powered Next Gen Stat (Tackle Probability) to enhance game analysis
• Implementation of generative AI tools at NFL Media to increase operational efficiency
• Continued development of the Digital Athlete tool for injury prevention and informing rule changes
• Utilization of AWS for NFL Films' digital archive and NFL+ infrastructure, potentially improving content delivery and fan experience

Negative

• None.

Tech Expert

The NFL's extended partnership with AWS marks a significant leap in sports technology integration. The introduction of the AI-powered Tackle Probability model is a game-changer, offering unprecedented insights into player performance. This innovation, processing over 500 million data points per season, will revolutionize how teams analyze defensive strategies and player evasiveness.

The implementation of Amazon Q Business and Amazon Bedrock for NFL Media operations showcases a practical application of generative AI in content production. This could significantly boost productivity and content quality across NFL's media properties. However, it's important to monitor how this AI integration affects job roles and content authenticity in sports journalism.

The partnership's focus on player safety through the Digital Athlete tool is particularly noteworthy. By running millions of simulations, it has the potential to reduce injuries and inform rule changes, as seen with the new Dynamic Kickoff. This data-driven approach to player welfare could set a new standard in professional sports.

Market Research Analyst

This partnership extension signifies AWS's growing dominance in the sports tech market. For Amazon investors, it's a positive indicator of the company's diversification strategy and its ability to secure long-term, high-profile partnerships. The deal strengthens AWS's position in an increasingly competitive cloud services market, particularly against rivals like Microsoft and Google.

The integration of generative AI tools in NFL operations could serve as a proof of concept for other industries, potentially opening new revenue streams for AWS. The success of this implementation could lead to increased adoption of AWS services in other sports leagues and entertainment sectors.

However, investors should note that while this partnership enhances AWS's market position, its direct impact on Amazon's overall financial performance may be in the short term. The true value lies in the long-term potential for technology transfer and market expansion into other sectors.

NFL Media Implements Generative AI Tools to Boost Operational Efficiency

NEW YORK & SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- The National Football League and Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com company (NASDAQ: AMZN), today announced an extension of their long-term partnership. Since 2017, the NFL and AWS have been at the forefront of innovation, leveraging AWS's artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) services to shape the future of football.

(Graphic: Business Wire)

The global partnership will be on display during this week’s games with the debut of a new AI-powered Next Gen Stat that changes how we understand and analyze tackles in football. The Tackle Probability ML model predicts, at any given moment of a play, the likelihood that a given defender will make a tackle, helping to quantify which defenders are the most reliable tacklers and which ball carriers are most elusive. Tackle Probability can be used to calculate various metrics that can be applied to both offensive and defensive analysis, such as missed tackle attempts by a defender and missed tackles forced by a ball carrier.

To view a video of Tackle Probability in action, please go to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wqvAiuC7d7U.

Powered by AWS, the Next Gen Stats platform collects over 500 million data points each season. This wealth of data serves as the foundation for innovation throughout the NFL, from enhancing fan engagement through advanced statistics to transforming the viewing experience by enabling alternate broadcasts and new ways of visualizing the action on the field. Additionally, data-driven insights have a direct impact on the game itself by informing rule changes to make the game safer and even more exciting, including the NFL’s new Dynamic Kickoff.

A key component of the partnership renewal is the implementation of generative AI to increase operational efficiency and drive additional value for the league and its fans.

“Through our collaboration with AWS, we are continuously pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in football,” said Gary Brantley, chief information officer at the NFL. “By harnessing the power of data and advanced technologies like generative AI, together we are accelerating the pace of innovation in important areas such as player safety, fan engagement and content production. This season we’ll see an increase in operational efficiency as we begin to leverage AWS’s generative AI capabilities at NFL Media.”

NFL Media has implemented Amazon Q Business, a generative AI-powered assistant, so users can ask questions and get answers to a wide range of business intelligence and production questions. This enables a self-service helpdesk for common technical and operational questions with detailed and immediate responses. Additionally, NFL Media has launched a generative AI-powered research tool built on Amazon Bedrock that enables the production team to use natural language prompts to retrieve insights and relevant footage from distinct plays throughout the NFL’s Next Gen Stats database quicker than ever before.

These developments will boost employee productivity and enable teams to concentrate on producing high-quality content across NFL Media’s properties including NFL Network, NFL Films, NFL.com, NFL+, the NFL app and the NFL Channel on FAST platforms, as well as the NFL’s social media channels.

"The NFL and AWS share a passion for innovation and we are excited to continue to drive advancements across the NFL ecosystem," said Julie Souza, global head of sports at AWS. "As we look ahead, this partnership represents an opportunity for the NFL and AWS to reimagine the future of football in a world of quickly evolving technology. By leveraging AWS's cutting-edge capabilities, the NFL will unlock new levels of operational efficiency, further advance player health and safety and deliver unparalleled viewing experiences for fans worldwide."

Additionally, the partnership extension will build upon several industry-leading innovations, including:

• Next Gen Stats: The NFL’s proprietary player and ball tracking platform, Next Gen Stats, benefits the entire NFL ecosystem as it is utilized by the league, broadcasters, partners, teams, coaches, scouts and players. The NFL leverages AWS to help manage the scale, speed and complexity of the enormous data set. Further, the NFL utilizes AWS’s machine learning capabilities to help turn the tracking data into advanced statistics that help contextualize the action on the field.
  
  
• Digital Athlete: This cutting-edge injury recognition and analytics tool provides a complete view of an NFL player’s experience, using video and data from training, practice and in-game action. AWS technology runs millions of simulations of specific in-game and practice scenarios to identify which players are at risk of injury, enabling coaches and training staff to develop individualized injury prevention, training and recovery regimens. The Digital Athlete has also been instrumental in informing recent rule changes, including the NFL’s new, Dynamic Kickoff. The NFL used it to model the new kickoff, simulating 10,000 seasons’ worth of the play to better understand potential risk to players.
  
  
• NFL Big Data Bowl: The NFL annually hosts the Big Data Bowl powered by AWS, a crowd-sourced competition that challenges applicants to use data and technology to create new insights and make the game more exciting for fans. To date, more than 50 participants in the competition have been hired by NFL teams or league vendors to work in football analytics.
  
  
• Unified View of the Fan: The NFL has developed a platform on AWS that combines data from multiple sources to create a comprehensive view of fans across all touchpoints. By leveraging AWS’s advanced analytics capabilities, the league can glean deeper insights into fan behavior, preferences and engagement levels, enabling more personalized and tailored experiences.
  
  
• NFL Schedule: The NFL uses AWS to power its schedule-making process, running high-performance computing workloads to find the best possible schedule each year from a quadrillion possible combinations.
  
  
• NFL Films and NFL Media: The NFL utilizes AWS for NFL Films’ digital archive, ensuring that the league’s invaluable content is preserved and accessible for generations to come. Additionally, AWS provides the cloud infrastructure for NFL+, enabling the NFL to strengthen its direct relationship with fans and provide greater access to football content.

About Amazon Web Services

Since 2006, Amazon Web Services has been the world’s most comprehensive and broadly adopted cloud. AWS has been continually expanding its services to support virtually any workload, and it now has more than 240 fully featured services for compute, storage, databases, networking, analytics, machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), mobile, security, hybrid, media, and application development, deployment, and management from 108 Availability Zones within 34 geographic regions, with announced plans for 18 more Availability Zones and six more AWS Regions in Mexico, New Zealand, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Taiwan, Thailand, and the AWS European Sovereign Cloud. Millions of customers—including the fastest-growing startups, largest enterprises, and leading government agencies—trust AWS to power their infrastructure, become more agile, and lower costs. To learn more about AWS, visit aws.amazon.com.

About Amazon

Amazon is guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational excellence, and long-term thinking. Amazon strives to be Earth’s Most Customer-Centric Company, Earth’s Best Employer, and Earth’s Safest Place to Work. Customer reviews, 1-Click shopping, personalized recommendations, Prime, Fulfillment by Amazon, AWS, Kindle Direct Publishing, Kindle, Career Choice, Fire tablets, Fire TV, Amazon Echo, Alexa, Just Walk Out technology, Amazon Studios, and The Climate Pledge are some of the things pioneered by Amazon. For more information, visit amazon.com/about and follow @AmazonNews.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20240910844846/en/

Media Contacts:

Liana Bailey

liana.bailey@nfl.com

Darlene Capiro

dcapiro@amazon.com

Source: Amazon.com, Inc.

FAQ

What new AI-powered statistic did the NFL and AWS introduce for the 2024 season?

The NFL and AWS introduced Tackle Probability, an AI-powered Next Gen Stat that predicts the likelihood of a defender making a tackle at any given moment during a play.

How is the NFL using generative AI in its operations with AWS (AMZN)?

NFL Media has implemented Amazon Q Business, a generative AI assistant, for answering business intelligence and production questions. They've also launched a generative AI-powered research tool built on Amazon Bedrock for quick retrieval of insights and footage from the Next Gen Stats database.

What is the Digital Athlete tool developed by the NFL and AWS (AMZN)?

The Digital Athlete is an injury recognition and analytics tool that provides a complete view of an NFL player's experience. It uses video and data from training, practice, and in-game action to identify injury risks and inform rule changes.

How does the NFL use AWS (AMZN) for its schedule-making process?

The NFL uses AWS to run high-performance computing workloads that analyze quadrillions of possible combinations to find the best possible schedule each year.