Lucerne, Switzerland, May 13, 2015 - With the FIVB sanctioning Beach Volleyball events since 1987 and with the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour Lucerne Open 2015 being the second event in Season No. 29 of the competition, the inaugural stop on Lake Lucerne marks the start of the “testing” for the use of the electronic score-sheet at international stops.
“The initial test of the electronic score sheet started several weeks ago at a European confederation event,” said Joep Van Iersel, the FIVB Technical Supervisor for the US$150,000 Lucerne Open. “The goal is to complete the test by the middle of June so we will have the electronic score sheet available for the start of the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships in The Netherlands.”
With the Lucerne Open being the first of five-straight FIVB World Tour events in Europe, the testing of the electronic score sheet for Beach Volleyball will continue next week (May 20-24) in the Czech Republic for the women’s only Prague Open followed by the Moscow Grand Slam (May 26-31), and SWATCH Major Series events in Croatia (Poreč, June 2-7) and Norway (Stavanger, June 9-14).
“As Beach Volleyball continues to develop at a very fast pace, the management of each game has to keep in sync with new and innovative ways to support the competition,” said José Casanova, the FIVB Beach Volleyball Refereeing Commissioner. “In conjunction with the all the FIVB confederations, we are working hard in order to standardize procedures to improve the management of all matches at all Beach Volleyball events.”
With the CEV initiating the electronic score sheet “test” and the FIVB partnering with the European confederation, the 2015 season continues the innovation process with the use of modern technology to further improve the image and general perception of the sport.
“As far as technology and innovation are concerned, the creation of an electronic score sheet is a major step forward for Beach Volleyball,” said Emilio Spirito, the chief operating officer for Data Project of Bologna, Italy. “The role of the electronic score sheet creates a continuous assessment of a Beach Volleyball match with the end result being an immediate accounting of the competition results.”
Spirito, who played professionally in the sport in the 1980s, and his staff is working closely with FIVB and CEV officials to have the electronic score sheet ready for the 2015 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships to be played June 26 through July 5 at four locations in The Netherlands.
“As the founder of Data Project, Spirito and his company have acquired international credibility,” said Van Iersel. “Their work in developing industry-leading software has been impressive for the past 10 years. Their state-of-the-art of official electronic scoring management will greatly enhanced the sport of Beach Volleyball.”
“We are sure that our Beach Volleyball software tools will be indispensable for the sport,” said Spirito. “As always, our goal is to always be innovative. Since 1982, we have grown from the revolutionary idea of creating a software tool for the statistical scouting of Volleyball matches. Today, we are creating several software tools for the management of all aspects of Beach Volleyball and Volleyball matches”
Bottom-line for the Italian-based company is to continue as the world-wide leader in developing statistics and video analysis software and supplying services of e-scoring, scouting, in-venue display, broadcasting and telecasting of statistic data to the most important Beach Volleyball and Volleyball events throughout the world.”
“With these great efforts, know-how, specific tools and experience have earned Data Project global recognition as the industry standard for Beach Volleyball and Volleyball software,” said Van Iersel. “With the Lucerne Open playing an instrumental role in the development and testing of the electronic score sheet, we look forward to using the program ‘officially” for the first-time at the world championships at the four sites in The Netherlands.”
The innovative electronic score sheet falls in line with the goal of the FIVB that is headed by President Dr. Ary S. Graça F°, who has said repeatedly that he "stood for opportunities and innovation. These two words are very important even more so today. We must give opportunities to the whole world and technology is the innovation of the world. We cannot stay still in the past."