Published on the 04/02/2025 | Written by Heather Wright
Fast racing, fast network…
Just as businesses are seeking high-speed data connections so they can analyse data, make better decisions and gain greater visibility, so too is SailGP – which let’s face it is big business too, with its multimillion-dollar catamarans and courses around the world. The global sailing competition has inked a deal with Ericsson to provide 5G networks and edge computing on the water.
The technology will be used for marine racing data analytics and real-time performance monitoring during racing, handling more than 53 billion data points from the catamaran fleet each race day.
“Reliable, scalable connectivity helps teams optimise performance and maintain fair competition while significantly enriching the fan experience.”
The deal between the global racing league, which was launched in 2018 by Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison and Kiwi yachtsman Russell Coutts, and Ericsson comes as sports events becoming increasingly high-tech and data driven.
Sports around the world have been taking advantage of 5G to provide data to improve how players perform and the experience fans can have while watching sports. Sports on the open water, however, present their own challenges, with a lack of permanent infrastructure on the water, challenging maritime conditions and, in SailGP’s case, a global circuit with 50-foot flying catamarans racing at speeds of up to 100 km per hour over open waters.
Cradlepoint routers will be installed in the wings of each F50 catamaran and providing data including IoT, video and critical communications from competing boats into Oracle Cloud infrastructure via the private 5G network.
Ericsson says the enterprise wireless solution will improve fan experiences and race operations, while supporting SailGP umpires to adjudicate on race protocols, with 5G-enabled live streaming from competing F50 catamarans and insights into team locations, tactics and strategy.
It’s expected to provide performance optimisation and enhanced tactical decision making with access to real time data on things such as boat speed, wind conditions, race position and course layout, enabling real time data analysis to help with maximising speed and efficiency of the boat and making informed tactical decisions during racing.
But it’s also expected to increase fairness and transparency.
“The real-time transportation of data directly and securely into Oracle Cloud enables racers to share data with all teams, including boat speed, wind direction and course layout, and race position. This helps SailGP prevent any unfair advantages and promotes fair competition.”
For spectators, the offering promises greater insights into the intricacies of sailing tactics and strategy.
Warren Jones, SailGP chief technology officer, says private 5G combined with the edge routers not only matches the bandwidth and latency challenges of billions of data points during a race, but also addresses SailGP’s need to quickly deploy networks at locations around the world.
“This reliable, scalable connectivity helps teams optimise performance and maintain fair competition while significantly enriching the fan experience through visibility into race analytics,” Jones says.
The implementation follows earlier trials with Ericsson and US wireless network provider T-Mobile at US events last season, and will be installed and deployed in all F50s and rolled out globally for the 2025 season, which started in the UAE in November and was in New Zealand last month. Next stop is Australia, where racing starts this week.
