{"id":63354,"date":"2015-10-28T08:32:11","date_gmt":"2015-10-28T08:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?guid=e0851bc8bdab6ff2e66fe3ba347a71c8"},"modified":"2015-10-28T08:32:11","modified_gmt":"2015-10-28T08:32:11","slug":"news-story-walljam-novel-rebound-ball-game-spurs-youngsters-to-get-active","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?p=63354","title":{"rendered":"News story: WallJAM: novel rebound ball game spurs youngsters to get active"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A novel interactive rebound wall for ball games has made its debut on BT Sport<\/a>\u2019s Football Tonight show.<\/p>\n

Former England star Michael Owen was the first to test his talents against a wall designed especially for the show by WallJAM<\/a>. Stevenage-based entrepreneur Tim Worboys developed the technology with support from Innovate UK.<\/p>\n

WallJAM\u2019s array of impact sensors measure accuracy, speed and power in striking the ball against targets, all timed against the clock. Watch a video demonstration here<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Tim wants to encourage more young people to take up active sport. He first approached Innovate UK in 2012, inspired by an idea that he could reinvent in digital form what children had been doing for decades to improve their hand-eye-foot coordination \u2013 hitting a ball against a wall.<\/p>\n

Funding for prototype development<\/h3>\n

Innovate UK provided support through Smart awards<\/a> totalling \u00a375,000 for proof-of-market and prototype development. Tim explained:<\/p>\n

\n

That help from Innovate UK has allowed me to get where I am today. We\u2019re getting close to a realistic market launch. The clever bit is how we get the sensors to interact with all the associated hardware.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

WallJAM is modular and scalable and comes in a range of sizes, suited to both the indoor and outdoor use. It\u2019s ideal for multiplayer activity too. <\/p>\n

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The core market initially is the leisure and sports sector. With economies of scale, there should be opportunities in the school and education market too.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The business has benefited from two rounds of equity funding, including \u00a3100,000 raised on CrowdCube<\/a> in April 2015.<\/p>\n

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Read about how other businesses have benefited from Smart funding.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Starring role on TV football show for Hertfordshire firm’s interactive sports technology, developed with funding from Innovate UK.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63354"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=63354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63354\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=63354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=63354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=63354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}