Nine new companies have joined AO StartUps, strengthening the program’s commitment to AI‑enabled innovation across sport and major events.
The new cohort — VueMotion, Bettercup, CRED, Bronco, truefuels, National Pickleball League, Aircast, RootNote and Outcoach — reflects the program’s commitment to shaping the future of sport, sustainability, fan engagement and performance through real‑world experimentation at the Australian Open.
Launched to fast‑track emerging technologies and concepts in a high‑performance environment, AO StartUps gives selected companies access to industry expertise, world‑class venues, global broadcast exposure and a live audience of more than one million fans.
Tennis Australia Director of Innovation Dr Machar Reid said the latest cohort embodies the rapid shift toward AI‑enabled systems.
“Across sport and major events, AI is no longer a future concept — it’s a present‑day competitive advantage,” Dr. Reid said.
“A large share of this cohort are using AI to solve real operational challenges - improving sustainability, enhancing content workflows, supporting coaches, capturing new audiences and generating insights that weren’t possible even two years ago.
“There’s no substitute for real‑world testing at the scale of the Australian Open, and we’re excited to help these founders accelerate their ideas with genuine impact.”
The cohort of 2026 AO StartUps companies are:
truefuels (Spain): redesigning the way athletes fuel their bodies. Built in the lab, proven on the road, truefuels delivers optimised energy without compromise. Because when every detail matters, only the best fuel will do.
CRED (US): a predictive intelligence platform that helps organisations identify and engage high-value opportunities through real-time market signals and data enrichment.
Bronco (Ireland): AI-powered operating system for the business of sport. The platform unifies players, agents, clubs, brands, and governing bodies centralising performance data, commercial deals, and market intelligence into one seamless ecosystem.
Bettercup (Australia): Bettercup eliminates single-use plastic from event waste streams. From reusable products to impactful support services, they make reuse easy and commercially viable at scale.
National Pickleball League (Australia): NPL is the premium pickleball organisation of Australia. The NPL brand offers Australia’s professional national league, tournaments, corporate days, school/university programs, social leagues, events & introductory Pickleball days.
Aircast (Australia): the world’s fastest real-time streaming technology, delivering ultra-low-latency video and audio to fans, broadcasters, and venues anywhere in the world.
RootNote (US): the first comprehensive analytics platform designed to help content creators, media companies, influencers, athletes, and the teams, organisations, and brands that they work with leverage their data from hundreds of platforms to grow their business.
VueMotion (Australia): a smartphone-based AI platform delivering clinical-grade motion analysis without wearables or lab setups. By converting simple video into detailed kinematic data, coaches and clinicians can assess speed, range of motion, gait efficiency and asymmetries in real-world environments.
Outcoach (Australia): AI coaching management platform that helps tennis businesses save time on admin, strengthen parent engagement and increase customer retention.
Previous companies to have joined AO StartUps include Intix, Foodini, Oho, Lumi, Exar.Live, Volta, LILA, Back Sync, New Stream, Electrokare, Grandstand, BatFast, 1080 Motion, Pendular, CAMB.AI, Prism Neuro, Trickshot, DVOX, Stringr, Straffr, Circular, PAM, Raven, Cape Bionics, Equidi, Calyx, MATCHi, Amperfii and YBVR.
About AO StartUps
AO StartUps is the latest step in Tennis Australia’s innovation and venture capital strategy which helps startup companies pilot their cutting-edge technology at the AO and other areas of Tennis Australia’s business.
Companies participating in AO StartUps are provided the opportunity to prove their business models in real time and directly access proprietary intel and exposure at one of the world’s largest sport and entertainment events. It has been designed to extract maximum value for the startup, streamline corporate processes that can often stifle innovating at speed, and provide an opportunity for investment via Tennis Australia’s venture capital funds, AO Ventures and Wildcard Ventures.
Visit aostartups.ausopen.com to learn more.
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