LOS ANGELES, Jan. 18, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Mustard, the world's first sensorless connected-coaching platform for skill sports, today announced a $3.75 million seed round led by the Lake Nona Sports & Health Tech Fund (a partnership between leAD Sports & Health Tech Partners and Tavistock Group). New investors also include, among others, Mark Cuban, OneTeam Partners, Ronnie Lott, Justin Rose, the Major League Soccer Players Association, the United States Women's National (Soccer) Team Players Association, owners of several major professional sports teams, Global Rugby Ventures, Dan Rosensweig (CEO of Chegg!), Gary and Adam Jacobs, and the Wessell family. They join existing investors including Drew Brees, Nolan Ryan, Reid Ryan, Justine Siegal, Shasta Ventures, Intersect VC, and David Novak. The round brings Mustard's total funding to $6M, and will be used to develop the company's groundbreaking connected-coaching platform across numerous major skill sports.
"Our new investors bring force-multiplying experience and relationships across all major American sports," says Rocky Collis, CEO and co-founder of Mustard. "As we expand our platform to include additional major sports beyond baseball, athletes everywhere will be able to learn their personal recipe for improvement, regardless of their resources."
Mustard's patent-pending AI and computer vision system utilizes regular video captured from the user's mobile phone to evaluate the athlete's mechanics, and to connect coaching with what is actually happening with an athlete's body. The tech development is spearheaded by engineers who formerly worked at Major League Baseball Advanced Media (MLBAM). Feedback is delivered in real-time through a report card that provides a customized performance plan to help the athletes take actionable steps towards improvement. The machine-learning algorithm uses data captured by legendary coach and Mustard co-founder Dr. Tom House during his 40 years of experience working with the best athletes in the world across multiple sports. With the new funding, the company aims to produce more live and recorded connected instructional content for an expanded array of major sports, including golf, soccer and football, as well as hiring several additional team members with disruptive tech experience.
"We believe that Mustard has a winning recipe with a world-class team led by CEO Rocky Collis, game-changing technology, an engaging user experience, and an incredibly strong network of partners and investors," explained Thomas H. Rudy, Principal of the Lake Nona Sports & Health Tech Fund. "We will be an active investor in the company, making our resources and infrastructure in Lake Nona available to scale into other sports."
In conjunction with Co-founder Jason Goldsmith, the renowned mental performance coach and author, Mustard offers its athletes elite mental performance training through both live and recorded content.
"Elite coaching and training has historically included technical-connected analysis accessible to only the elite," said Jacob Mullins, Managing Director of Shasta Ventures."Mustard's connected-coaching platform is a first across skill sports – it changes the paradigm and allows for anyone to access once exclusive coaching and analysis with the ease of a mobile phone.The computer vision technology and AI/ML team are world-class, and I can't wait to see what they'll accomplish next."
In addition to the founders and world-class investors, the company gains further momentum with best-in-class advisors across multiple sports and industries, including: Drew Brees (NFL all-time great and humanitarian), Nolan Ryan (MLB Hall of Famer), Mia Hamm (all-time-great soccer player, 2x Olympic Gold Medalist and 2x World Cup Champion), Mike Candrea (the winningest NCAA softball coach of all time), Anson Dorrance (Women's World Cup Champion coach and the winningest NCAA soccer coach of all time), Cam Cameron (NFL coaching great), Cindy Parlow Cone (US soccer hall of famer and President of the US Soccer Federation), Meghan Klingenberg (World Cup Champion), Fred Whitfield (President of the Charlotte Hornets), Justine Siegal (Renowned baseball coach; first female coach of a professional men's baseball team); Kevin Kirk (PGA Coach of the Year), Rob Friedman (American baseball analyst and social media personality known as the "PitchingNinja"), Tom Penn (co-owner and immediate past President of LAFC), and Adam Dedeaux (disciple of Tom House and throwing coach to numerous NFL QBs).
"There are so many young athletes out there who could be future Olympians, MLB pitchers, or high school state champions in whatever sport they're passionate about," says Drew Brees. "For me, that was football. Unfortunately, many young athletes lack access to the type of coaching I received. I believe Mustard truly levels the playing field, making elite training accessible and affordable for young, aspiring athletes, and I'm proud to support their mission."
ABOUT MUSTARDMustard is revolutionizing the power of play by making widely accessible automatic, hyper-personalized training plans for physical and mental training from two of the most successful coaches of all time: Dr. Tom House and Jason Goldsmith. Armed with a proprietary, sensorless automatic motion identification and analysis tool, Mustard's platform conducts complex data analysis of video captured in app on a player or coach's mobile phone, and delivers easily understandable report cards along with personalized, actionable drills to optimize performance. Learn more at: www.teammstrd.com.
ABOUT THE LAKE NONA FUNDThe Lake Nona Sports & Health Tech Fund, a partnership between leAD Sports and Tavistock Group, invests in early-stage companies shaping the future of sports and health technology. The $30M Fund focuses on three investment areas: Health & Well-being, Fan Engagement, and Connected Athletes. Located in Lake Nona - an Orlando-based tech community heralded as the home of sports and health tech — the Fund scales the best sports and health tech companies in the world, providing access to the foremost domain experts and industry leaders, world-class infrastructure, and smart capital. For more information, please visit https://www.lakenonafund.com/
MEDIA CONTACT: Lauren Gill, MAG PR at [email protected]; Telephone: 978-473-1362
SOURCE Mustard
