WTT Star Contender Goa: How Stupa, a sports analytics company, brought a World Table Tennis event to India

The WTT Star Contender in Goa, a World Table Tennis event, from 27 February to 5 March, is the first of its kind in India, being organised by Stupa Sports Analytics. (Photo: Twitter)

For a data and analytics company, it made sense for Stupa Sports Analytics to take a punt at organising a World Table Tennis (WTT) event in India.

The WTT Star Contender in Goa, being held from February 27 to March 5, is the first of its kind in the country, propelled by the company that’s entered a niche space of data analytics for a sport that’s not yet hugely popular in India.

The company uses Artificial Intelligence to analyse the sport, allowing for players and coaches to measure their strengths and weaknesses, enabling event organisers to digitise the tournaments. Stupa is already collaborating with the sport’s governing body, the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF), and about 11 sports federations across the globe, including Brazil, Sweden and Norway.

A host of international players, including the Puerto Rican Diaz sisters, Adriana (ranked no. 14) and Melanie (129), German Benedikt Duda (35), American Kanak Jha (21) and Slovenian No. 10 Darko Jorgic are among Stupa’s approximately 10,000 users.

“We are a sports tech company in TT and we are the first to build such tech,” says Megha Gambhir, the co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of Stupa at the Dr Shyama Prasad Mukherjee Indoor Stadium in Taleigao, where the WTT Star Contender is being held.

“For us, it’s more about TT development,” adds Deepak Malik, the co-founder and chief operating officer, who is also a table tennis coach. “If you look at world rankings, from under-11 to under-21, there are so many Indian juniors in top 10-20 rankings, which is happening for the first time. That motivated us to bring these kind of events to India — for exposure and inspiration.” Three Indians are in the top 20 world rankings of boys’ and girls’ singles currently.

The way the four-year-old Stupa works is that it records a match or a practice session and the purely tech-based solution uses Artificial Intelligence to gauge ball speed, where the ball is landing, etc., in real time. “We offer the same to players and a deeper analysis to understand what they have been doing wrong,” says Gambhir.

Malik felt the need for an analytical tool as a coach, when he faced challenges while holding training camps. Players would come to him from smaller towns with weak techniques and he felt unequipped to teach them better skills in a 15-day session.

“Data is a gold mine and key for the future,” adds Gambhir. “Just imagine a kid in school who does not have an assessment on which subject he is better at and which is poor. How will he improve? We are doing something similar — we tell table tennis players that this is the area you need to work on.”

“Exposure-wise, it’s important to have (an event like this),” adds Malik. “What happens now is that many (Indian) players, when they have to earn points for rankings, they have to travel abroad. Many don’t have the finances. If we start having these events in India for juniors and seniors, it’s a massive gain for whole fraternity.” Thirty Indian players — men and women — competed in the singles qualifying draws of this tournament on February 27-28.

The five-year arrangement with WTT allows Stupa time to break even financially, which may not happen this year considering one of their sponsors backed out at the last minute. The founders admit that the hardest part is getting sponsors and investors. “Someone has to take the plunge though,” Gambhir says. “Next year, we are focussed, we will break even and make this event profitable and invest back in.”

Over 4,000 tickets have been sold for the WTT Star Contender in Goa, the co-founders say, with tickets priced at a reasonable Rs 49 to Rs 499 besides the VIP seating. While empty seats in the stadium in the initial few days indicate a poor response to the tournament, the organisers believe this to be teething problems caused by a paucity of time in organising an event of this magnitude.

The company has two models, enterprise and individual. Enterprise includes federations that pay a licence to consume the platform. The other is for clubs that might want to hold an event or for individuals who pay a platform fee.

The founders give the example of table tennis federations globally that struggle to collect data at a ground level. “Stupa brings a digital solution to conduct events seamlessly,” says Gambhir. “Also, to collect data, streamline, create media and enable them to monetise.”

For instance, Malik says India has only 5,000 registered table tennis players (as opposed to a smaller country like Sweden that has 65,000), but they believe the Indian numbers could be as high as 400,000-500,000 if measured accurately.

The WTT Star Contender also allows Stupa to seek more funding, which will help them reach out to more federation partners, build its technology to include sports like badminton and squash. The WTT Star Contender provides the company with a business opportunity, to strengthen its collaboration with table tennis’ governing body, bring sponsorships and investments into the sport.

The company’s target is to increase its platform licences to 40-50 in the next year.

“There is a difference in how small federations have a vast player base and we being the largest population in the world, the sport is still underrated. I think in India, other that cricket, most sports are underrated. But the way badminton and kabaddi have picked up, we felt this sport, too, can pick up well. That’s the first reason for this WTT,” says Gambhir.