NEW YORK – The NBA’s Referee Engagement and Performance System (REPS) application was named the Capgemini Innovation of the Year at the 2022 Sports Technology Awards, presented by the STA Group. The Awards featured 19 categories represented by 110 brands, 37 sports and five continents.

The REPS app is designed to aid referees and management in evaluation, collaboration, training and development. It utilizes a centralized performance platform with video integration and social messaging that allows users to watch, analyze, share, save, categorize and comment on plays. The application was designed and developed in collaboration between NBA Referee Operations and NBA Information Technology.

REPS provides game officials and referee operations development advisors with a tool that is accessible from a laptop, tablet or mobile device. It turns training and development into a social experience where officials are utilizing technology to better engage and learn and referee management is improving its training and development of the officiating staff.

Launched in December 2020, REPS has substantially increased engagement within the officiating community and coaching from referee operations management. The application improved on-court performance, enabled more consistent adjustment across the officiating staff and fostered sustainable enhancement to how management trains, develops and evaluates officials. In its first season of operation, the application increased referee and management engagement 935 percent over the use of email as a form of communication between the two parties.

With the creation of playlists, referees and management can quickly curate and organize examples of plays and events to optimize peer-to-peer learning. More than 2,000 playlists were created in REPS in its first season. Through live game video, users can immediately view game events from a variety of angles, add events to a playlist or share clips in real-time for immediate feedback and training.

Other features in the application include rule tests with video integration, a referee expense and logistic module, a search to easily find and view past events, notifications for real-time awareness and a resource page for rule books.

On the management side, the REPS platform helps the developmental advisors evaluate the officials, utilizing standardized performance criteria and tracking individual and staff-wide trends in real time. It also helps capture and organize qualitive feedback that referees receive daily.

The STA Group is a multifaceted sports technology business, operating at the heart of sport globally. The Group’s awards attract hundreds of entries from more than 30 countries and 50 sports, and boast a network including Olympians, Paralympians, World Champions, leading coaches, business figures, tech visionaries and successful entrepreneurs.