Brisbane firm VALD could provide Los Angeles Rams with winning edge in NFL Super Bowl
The Brisbane sports technology company that helped LA Rams win the Super Bowl could one day use its know-how to treat your grandma’s dodgy hip.
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Laurie Malone and his team at VALD were more than interested spectators watching the big plays during the NFL Super Bowl LVI on Monday.
The Los Angeles Rams — who beat the Cincinnati Bengals — is one of more than a 1000 professional sporting teams around the world that uses VALD’s technology to achieve a winning edge.
Mr Malone, who is VALD’s chief executive, said they have an “interest” in most major sport events around the globe with 88 per cent of their business offshore.
Their ground breaking software provides data to sporting teams to keep their personnel in the best shape possible.
With billions of dollars invested in elite sport, star athletes who can’t get on the track or have their careers end prematurely because of injuries are costly. VALD’s high performance human measurement technologies arm health professionals with the knowledge on how to treat a troublesome hamstring, calf, knee and more.
Mr Malone said while they will continue to service elite sport, VALD’s future growth will come not from helping to prolong the career of a 150kg offensive linesman in the NFL but providing data to treating a grandmother’s dodgy hip.
“We’re democratising health technology so it’s not just the NFL teams,” he said.
“The Super Bowl is a great thing to be involved in helping teams win but for us the greater good is helping everyday individuals get back to work or pick up their grandchild.
“There are about 8000 professional sporting teams globally but in relation to healthcare there are a hundred times more if not a thousand times more organisations globally that can use our services.”
The company started in January 2015 by Mr Malone and VALD’s chief strategy officer Sam James from a research and design collaboration at the Queensland University of Technology.
Seven years on VALD has 135 staff with a head office in Newstead, Brisbane, and offices in Britain and the US, and a suite of six products from a combination of internal development and external acquisitions. Growth is running at about 100 per cent a year.
As well as NFL teams, high profile clients are from the English Premier League, NBA teams, Major League Baseball and in Australia the AFL and NRL.
It also increasingly sells its technology to clinics, universities, hospitals and defence departments
Mr Malone said since they have started they have completed more than 7 million tests. “It’s been a bit of a whirlwind,” he said.
“We are a very global organisation but we are very proud to be in Queensland and we will remain here.”
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Originally published as Brisbane firm VALD could provide Los Angeles Rams with winning edge in NFL Super Bowl
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