Scott Harniman, the UFL’s SVP/media and innovation, describes the spring football league as an “incubator of technology.”
And what is any tech incubator without a demo day?
That’s essentially what the UFL plans to put on Saturday afternoon in Washington, D.C., during its 2026 championship game — the United Bowl — at Audi Field. This is the UFL’s third season-capping tech showcase since the league launched (in its latest form) in 2024, and it is expecting more than 40 attendees, from league partners to influencers, to take in demonstrations from several of the league’s tech vendors.
“The goal is showing what we can from an innovation standpoint, a technology standpoint,” Harniman told SBJ ahead of the event. “We look forward to it every year.”
Run of show
One change from last year’s showcase is a move from a high-up suite in the venue to one on the field level. The aim is to give attendees a more intimate view of the action, and it could create a unique perspective on demos from companies such as tracking data firm Sportable, which will stream a data-rich alternate feed of the game as it happens using real-time information derived from sensors in the football and on players’ pads.
The suite will also include displays from ESPN (a monitor showing its “Skycast” alt-cast of the game), wearable camera company Povora and playback software DVSport (a station for viewing replay angles that UFL officials use to adjudicate challenges).
FAST takeaways
This is also the second year of the UFL’s FAST (Football Advancement Through Sports Technology) program for testing and launching new innovations.
Year 1 produced the UFL’s ongoing partnership with Sportable. But even when the program doesn’t lead to a longer-term relationship — such as with Mindfly, whose BodyCam product was used on players’ chest plates and shoulder pads last season — there are learnings.
“There were challenges — and, really, not all on their side,” Harniman said of Mindfly. “The physicality of the game and wearing a camera on the chest, it was really hard. ... But we also saw, when we did capture [video], that in-game speed — the audio, the video of collisions — it was so dramatic that wanted to continue.”
So, the UFL pivoted to Povora, which deployed its “CapCam” during the 2026 season on UFL referees and, in a first for the company, even a coach — the Orlando Storm’s Anthony Becht. Povora on Saturday will also debut a new body camera, worn by a member of the chain crew, that automatically pans side-to-side based on the head motion of the person wearing it, powered by a wireless connection to an IMU earpiece.
“We were right in the heart of the action when Anthony was talking to his guys, which is a really unique perspective we were excited to see [on broadcast],” said Povora co-founder and CCO Nathan Horrocks. “We’re also looking at how we can go forward with that. Who else can we use the camera on?”
The UFL’s 2026 FAST class also includes EA Sports, Riddell, The 33rd Team and AI audio firm Vokol, demonstrating the league’s openness to technologies both established and startup.
Co-founder and Head of Growth Chris Shreeve said Vokol generated hundreds of bite-sized, AI-generated podcast episodes for the UFL during the season, predominately based on the league’s editorial coverage. These clips canvassed league/team news and “know before you go” FAQs for fans attending games, with the latter driving a better than 40% click-through rate to additional content, according to Shreeve.
“It’s been as good of a relationship as we possibly could have asked for, and I think it all stems from the top-down mandate they [the UFL] have to innovate,” he said. “They’ve gone above and beyond to try to do something different.”
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