Mustard Raises $1.7 Million to Bring AI Athletic Coaching to Smartphones
A new app called Mustard uses AI and smartphone cameras to analyze athletic mechanics and provide personalized coaching tips. The platform initially focuses on baseball and aims to make elite training accessible and affordable for young athletes.
Mustard launches a new mobile app that uses AI to analyze athletic mechanics and offer corrective tips, aiming to replace or augment expensive human coaching. Co-founded by pitching expert Tom House, the app seeks to solve the problem of young athletes dropping out of sports by age 13 due to high costs and limited access to quality training. The platform brings the same biomechanical analysis used by Hall of Fame athletes directly to a user's smartphone.
The startup raises $1.7 million in a funding round led by Shasta Ventures and Intersect VC, with notable angel investors including all-star athletes Nolan Ryan and Drew Brees. Ryan serves as a prominent face of the company, which currently opens a limited, free public beta focused exclusively on baseball. The development team includes engineers with experience from Major League Baseball Advanced Media.
The app works by utilizing the smartphone's built-in camera alongside proprietary AI algorithms to monitor a player's motion and simulate human athletic coaching. While the product remains entirely free during its initial beta phase, the company plans to introduce a low-cost monthly subscription for premium features in the future while maintaining a valuable free version. Mustard eventually intends to expand its AI coaching capabilities to include other sports beyond baseball.