Case study questions
Brooksdd77 
Chapter2Casestudy.docxChapter 2
Data Changes How NFL Teams Play the Game and How Fans See It
All professional sports teams today collect detailed data on player and team performance, fan behavior, and sales, and increasingly use these data to drive decisions about every aspect of the business—marketing, ticketing, player evaluation, and TV and digital media deals. This includes the National Football League (NFL), which is increasingly turning to data to improve how its players and teams perform and how fans experience the game.
Since 2014 the NFL has been capturing player movement data on the field by putting nickel-sized radio frequency identification (RFID) tags beneath players’ shoulder pads to track every move they make. The information the sensors gather is used by NFL teams to improve their training and strategy, by commentators on live game broadcasts, and by fans attending games or using the NFL app on the Xbox One.
The NFL’s player tracking system is based on the Zebra Sports Solution developed by Zebra Technologies, a Chicago-based firm specializing in tracking technology that includes the bar codes on groceries and other consumer goods and radio frequency identification (RFID) technology. The Zebra Sports Solution system records players’ speed, direction, location on the field, how far they ran on a play, and how long they were sprinting, jogging, or walking. The system can also determine what formation a team was in and how players’ speed or acceleration affects their on-field performance. Want to know how hard Eli Manning is throwing passes or the force with which a ball arrives in the hands of receiver Odell Beckham? The system knows how to do all that.
NFL players have RFID chips in their left and right shoulder pads that transmit data to 20 radio receivers strategically located in the lower and upper levels of stadiums to collect data about how each player moves, using metrics such as velocity, speed in miles per hour, and distance traveled. From there the data are transmitted to an on-site server computer, where Zebra’s software matches an RFID tag to the correct player or official. The football also has a sensor transmitting location data. The data are generated in real-time as the game is being played. Each sensor transmits its location about 25 times per player.
It takes just two seconds for data to be received by the motion sensors, analyzed, and pushed out to remote cloud computers run by Amazon Web Services for the NFL. From the NFL cloud computers, the data are shared with fans, broadcasters, and NFL teams. The data captured by the NFL are displayed to fans using the NFL Next Gen Stats website, NFL social media channels, and the NFL app on Windows 10 and the Xbox One. The data are also transmitted to the giant display screens in the arena to show fans during the game.
The data have multiple uses. NFL teams use them to evaluate player and team performance and to analyze tactics, such as whether it might be better to press forward or to punt in a particular fourth-down situation. Data transmitted to broadcasters, to stadium screens, to Next Gen Stats, and to the Next Gen Stats feature of Microsoft’s Xbox One NFL app help create a deeper fan experience that gets fans more involved in the game.
Some of the statistics fans can now see on Next Gen Stats include Fastest Ball Carriers, Longest Tackles, Longest Plays, Passing Leaders, Rushing Leaders, and Receiving Leaders. Next Gen Stats also features charts for individual players and videos that explain the differences and similarities between players, teams, and games based on the data.
While the data may be entertaining for fans, they could prove strategic for the teams. Data markers for each play are recorded, including type of offense, type of defense, whether there was a huddle, all movement during the play, and the yard line where the ball was stopped. The NFL runs custom-created analytics to deliver visualizations of the data to each team within 24 hours of the game, via a custom-built web portal. The system displays charts and graphs as well as tabular data to let teams have more insight. Each NFL team may also hire its own data analyst to wring even more value from the data. The data are giving NFL fans, teams, coaches, and players a deeper look into the game they love.
Sources: Jason Hiner, “How the NFL and Amazon Unleashed ‘Next Gen Stats’ to Grok Football Games,” TechRepublic, February 2, 2018; Teena Maddox, “Super Bowl 52: How the NFL and US Bank Stadium Are Ready to Make Digital History,” TechRepublic, February 1, 2018; Brian McDonough, “How the NFL’s Data Operation Tracks Every Move on the Field,” Information Management, December 7, 2016; www.zebra.com, accessed March 15, 2017; and Mark J. Burns, “Zebra Technologies, NFL Revamp Partnership For Third Season,” SportTechie, September 6, 2016.
Enterprise Systems
Firms use enterprise systems, also known as enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, to integrate business processes in manufacturing and production, finance and accounting, sales and marketing, and human resources into a single software system. Information that was previously fragmented in many different systems is stored in a single comprehensive data repository where it can be used by many different parts of the business.
For example, when a customer places an order, the order data flow automatically to other parts of the company that are affected by them. The order transaction triggers the warehouse to pick the ordered products and schedule shipment. The warehouse informs the factory to replenish whatever has been depleted. The accounting department is notified to send the customer an invoice. Customer service representatives track the progress of the order through every step to inform customers about the status of their orders. Managers are able to use firmwide information to make more-precise and timely decisions about daily operations and longer-term planning.
Supply Chain Management Systems
Firms use supply chain management (SCM) systems to help manage relationships with their suppliers. These systems help suppliers, purchasing firms, distributors, and logistics companies share information about orders, production, inventory levels, and delivery of products and services so they can source, produce, and deliver goods and services efficiently. The ultimate objective is to get the right amount of their products from their source to their point of consumption in the least amount of time and at the lowest cost. These systems increase firm profitability by lowering the costs of moving and making products and by enabling managers to make better decisions about how to organize and schedule sourcing, production, and distribution.
Supply chain management systems are one type of interorganizational system because they automate the flow of information across organizational boundaries. You will find examples of other types of interorganizational information systems throughout this text because such systems make it possible for firms to link digitally to customers and to outsource their work to other companies.
Customer Relationship Management Systems
Firms use customer relationship management (CRM) systems to help manage their relationships with their customers. CRM systems provide information to coordinate all of the business processes that deal with customers in sales, marketing, and service to optimize revenue, customer satisfaction, and customer retention. This information helps firms identify, attract, and retain the most profitable customers; provide better service to existing customers; and increase sales.
Knowledge Management Systems
Some firms perform better than others because they have better knowledge about how to create, produce, and deliver products and services. This firm knowledge is unique, is difficult to imitate, and can be leveraged into long-term strategic benefits. Knowledge management systems (KMS) enable organizations to better manage processes for capturing and applying knowledge and expertise. These systems collect all relevant knowledge and experience in the firm and make it available wherever and whenever it is needed to improve business processes and management decisions. They also link the firm to external sources of knowledge.
We examine enterprise systems and systems for supply chain management and customer relationship management in greater detail in Chapter 9. We discuss collaboration systems that support knowledge management in this chapter and cover other types of knowledge management applications in Chapter 11.
Intranets and Extranets
Enterprise applications create deep-seated changes in the way the firm conducts its business, offering many opportunities to integrate important business data into a single system. They are often costly and difficult to implement. Intranets and extranets deserve mention here as alternative tools for increasing integration and expediting the flow of information within the firm and with customers and suppliers.
Intranets are simply internal company websites that are accessible only by employees. The term intranet refers to an internal network, in contrast to the Internet, which is a public network linking organizations and other external networks. Intranets use the same technologies and techniques as the larger Internet, and they often are simply a private access area in a larger company website. Likewise with extranets, which are company websites that are accessible to authorized vendors and suppliers and are often used to coordinate the movement of supplies to the firm’s production apparatus.
