Coach Logic wins Australia & Ireland contracts for SAM

Coach Logic has launched an AI-powered coaching platform, SAM, and won contracts with Basketball Australia and the Football Association of Ireland.

The new product, short for Session Analysis Model, marks a shift for the Edinburgh-based sports technology business from its established team collaboration software to tools focused on coach development.

Founded in 2012 by former rugby coaches Andy Muir and Mark Cairns, Coach Logic has built its business with sports bodies and elite organisations including England Rugby, World Rugby and the International Hockey Federation. Its original Teams product helps coaches and players share and review performance material.

With SAM, Coach Logic is targeting a different problem: assessing coaches themselves. While athlete performance is increasingly shaped by data and video analysis, coach development has often relied on manual review and subjective observation.

Coaches can upload footage of training sessions to the platform, which analyses interactions, communication patterns and decision-making moments. The aim is to give them a more structured basis for reflection.

The system is also aimed at governing bodies overseeing large coaching networks, offering a way to deliver more consistent development programmes without adding staff.

Global push

The agreements with Basketball Australia and the Football Association of Ireland are part of the company's broader international expansion. They add to a customer base that already includes major sporting organisations in rugby and hockey.

The move comes as sports organisations seek more standardised ways to train and assess coaches across regions and levels of competition. For governing bodies, the challenge is often to maintain consistency within fixed budgets and limited staffing.

SAM is designed to reduce the administrative burden of video review by automating parts of the process. That is intended to leave more time for analysis and discussion, rather than manual tagging and note-taking.

Coach focus

Mark Cairns outlined the thinking behind the launch.

"SAM is about moving away from manual tagging and toward meaningful reflection. We built this because we have lived the problem as coaches ourselves. Where Teams brings players and coaches together, SAM is designed specifically to support the coach's own journey. It's about giving coaches the tools they deserve to grow their skills in a supportive, objective environment," said Cairns.

Coach Logic has presented the product as a response to a long-standing gap in sports technology. Much of the sector's investment in analysis tools has focused on player tracking, match review, and medical or fitness data, with less attention paid to systems for reviewing coaching practice.

That distinction has commercial significance. By moving into coach development, Coach Logic is broadening its role with sports bodies that already use digital tools for athlete analysis and team communication.

The company said SAM was built from more than a decade of experience working with coaches. The founders' background in rugby coaching has shaped the product strategy, with a focus on making video review easier to use in day-to-day practice.

Coach Logic did not disclose the value of the new contracts, but described them as part of a significant stage in its international growth as it seeks to sell its products in overseas markets.

The business is entering a market segment where sports bodies are under pressure to improve performance pathways while showing that coaching standards are being measured consistently. In that context, systems that can process session footage and surface patterns for review may appeal to organisations managing large numbers of coaches across national programmes.

Cairns said the product was built to support, rather than replace, the human side of coaching.