AI Case Study
The U.S. Open enhances and personalises the customer experience by offering fans content in near real time with IBM Watson.
To provide quicker digital access to the US Open Grand Slam, the U.S. Tennis Association is using IBM's AI technology, Watson. With the AI system, the USTA is able to analyse the enormous amount of data generated to provide fans with the best highlights, using a scoring system, in almost real time. Through their app, guests can also benefit from natural language processing to get their questions answered by a cognitive concierge.
Industry
Consumer Goods And Services
Entertainment And Sports
Project Overview
"Watson's new system, called Cognitive Highlights, measures the volume of the crowd (which is known to be raucous), the commentators' analysis, and the players' reactions. It assigns each of those a score from 0 to 1, and then uses those inputs to determine an Overall Excitement score. A point that results in a player yelling and fist pumping, then, will generate a higher score than one in which she pats her racket against her leg. The system can also parse the analysts' language, so a "solid" shot won't score as well as an "awesome" one." (inc.com)
"In addition to Cognitive Highlights, the US Open is also using Watson's Conversation API to power its Cognitive Concierge app. Just like Wimbledon's Watson-driven assistant Fred, it can help guests find dining and shopping options, as well as other services, around the venue." (engadget)
"With Watson Conversation API, USTA employees are able to take customer service to the next level. Embedded in the US Open app’s Guest Info feature, Watson is able to understand each and every fan’s questions — in their natural language — and deliver the real-time answers they need to navigate and personalize over 130 US Open attractions and 892 matches." (ibm)
Reported Results
An enhanced experience for the 700,000 attendees and all fans around the world
Technology
"Watson can look at massive amounts of video footage and dissect the vast amount of information in each frame to finally make this possible. With Cognitive Highlights, Watson watches almost all the matches, analyzes match data, player gestures and crowd cheers and selects the tournament’s most exciting moments so video editors and fans never have to miss a beat. It used deep learning models and “self-supervised” active learning techniques to recognize significant moments in a tennis match."
Function
Marketing
Digital Marketing
Background
"It’s impossible for one human to watch all of the biggest US Open matches simultaneously. The US Open is surrounded by data—on-the-court, off-the-court, on TV screens and across Twitter feeds. How can USTA employees and fans understand this data and put it into play? With IBM. Through this powerful partnership, USTA employees from video editors to the C-suite are serving fans real-time insights to enhance their experience." (ibm)
Benefits
Data
video footage, match data