DOYLESTOWN, Pa. — David Kliebhan, a mechanical engineer, has been playing tennis his whole life, keeping score and contesting shots that toed the line between in and out. Now, motivated by his son’s advancement in the sport, he developed a system that could take care of that so he, his son, and players across the country could focus on the game itself.
The result is AccuTennis, which, in addition to automating the scoring and umpiring facets of tennis, offers lessons and drills to help players improve their skills in serving, forehands, and backhands.
The technology lies in hardware installed on the court. Columns at the sides of the net conceal cameras pointed at various angles to capture different views. An additional camera is installed overhead to record gameplay. Speakers emit an automated voice that calls out the score and line judgments in conjunction with a digital scoreboard.
“The thing about us is that we’re hardware-based,” Kliebhan, who runs the business full-time with a part-time partner, told SportTechie. “Most people think you stick up cameras and you process it with graphic cards and tons of software. All that we don’t do; our different approach makes it much less expensive, and with our approach we’re also much more accurate, too.”
AccuTennis is accurate within a half-inch. Hawk-Eye, the most advanced tracking software used in tennis and other sports, is highly accurate but prohibitively expensive, while PlaySight is another option on the market, Kliebhan noted. But how does AccuTennis work?
The hardware transmits data to a computer and web server, which then feeds the information to an online interface that can be activated and used by the coaches and players on any mobile device. AccuTennis has been in place at Doylestown Tennis Club for a year and a half, where it is used about three times a day by 80 players and professional coaches, mostly for lessons.
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One lesson in particular, “Mr. Nobody,” allows players to practice their serves in a match format, scoring a point for every accurate serve and losing a point after two faults. The system will announce points and the digital readout will show the speed of each serve. Players can view statistics and a “shot plot” visualizing where their serves landed.
To supplement those stats, the cameras record video of each shot. Players type in a phone number, and the video will be sent to their coaches. AccuTennis will also generate a report after each drill, including video clips of serves and shots. “I tried to make this a little bit like Facebook, so I have an algorithm that picks up your best serve…probably an ace,” Kliebhan said. For fun’s sake, players can compare themselves to tennis legends Roger Federer and Angelique Kerber, with more to come.
The system isn’t perfect, Kliebhan admitted, but if it makes a mistake—or a ball from another court interferes—players can override with a simple gesture: holding their racket in the air for a few seconds. The same gesture activates the system for match play.
AccuTennis employs a revenue-sharing model, and Kliebhan envisions each player paying a $5 activation fee to use the system, which AccuTennis and the tennis club would split, once AccuTennis is in other clubs.
“This is a ground-up effort, so we’ve gotten to this point and it’s been really well-received,” Kliebhan said. “Teaching pros like it a lot, and the players like it a lot, and we’re just trying to get our startup company off and running.”