IBM serves up new fan experiences for Wimbledon 2022

IBM and The All England Lawn Tennis Club (The All England Club) have unveiled new technologies for Wimbledon fans around the world to experience the tournament digitally.

Powered by artificial intelligence (AI) running on IBM Cloud and hybrid cloud technologies, the new features for 2022 include ‘win factors’ that bring enhanced explainability to match insights and a ‘have your say’ feature that allows users to register their own predictions for match outcomes.

Co-created by IBM and The All England Club for Wimbledon.com and the Wimbledon app, the new features join a comprehensive suite of digital fan experiences, including IBM Power Index with Watson, IBM Match Insights with Watson and personalized recommendations and highlight reels – all designed to help global audiences stay more informed and engaged with players, matches and the tournament.

Kevin Farrar, sports partnership leader at IBM UK and Ireland, said: “The digital fan features on the Wimbledon app and Wimbledon.com are enabling the All England Club to immerse tennis lovers in the magic of The Championships, no matter where they are in the world. Sports fans love to debate and we’re excited to introduce a new tool this year to enable that by allowing people to register their own match predictions and compare them with predictions generated by Match Insights with Watson and those of other fans.”

Alexandra Willis, communications and marketing director at The All England Club, said: “Leveraging technology to help fans become more informed, engaged and involved throughout the Wimbledon Fortnight is at the core of our strategy to ensure we are leveraging innovation to keep Wimbledon relevant and deliver outstanding digital experiences for fans, wherever they may be.”