An innovative AI talent detection technology powered by Intel

may be able to identify Senegalese youth athletes who may otherwise remain undiscovered.

Sports scouts now find it very difficult to locate potential in remote or rural locations due to financial, time, and physical constraints.

These restrictions have two effects:

Many gifted people will never be able to pursue professional sports, and viewers might never get to witness the greatest sportsmen in the world.

Intel, the Global AI Platform Partner of the Olympic and Paralympic Games Paris 2024, along with its partners, are working to address this by delivering an AI platform technology sports talent detection application.

These issues are addressed by a novel AI talent detection tool developed in partnership with Intel, the International Olympic Committee (IOC), and the National Olympic Committee (NOC) of Senegal.

The software leverages Intel’s AI platform to identify talent through any smartphone with a camera, removing the need for pricey, specialized equipment and giving more people the chance to become future Olympic hopefuls in an effort to level the playing field and increase scouts’ reach.

The technology doesn’t end there. Computer vision analyzes the video, and artificial intelligence takes over. Talent scouts are then sent the stats.

It’s not simple to catch scouts’ notice in the hopes of breaking into the major sports leagues. It takes luck, money, persistence, and pure genius.

“This artificial intelligence platform for talent identification not only finds latent talent but also fills a gap in the market,” stated Caroline Rhoades, marketing manager for Intel’s Sales, Marketing, and Communications Group for the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Intel and the IOC collaborated to launch the app in March with the goal of assisting Senegalese youngsters in identifying potential Olympians.

The country on the west coast of Africa was selected for this endeavor ahead of Senegal’s capital Dakar hosting the Youth Olympic Games Dakar 2026.

Using the talent identification smartphone app made possible by Intel’s AI platform technology, Intel and IOC representatives visited six villages in Senegal and scored and evaluated the physical prowess of over a thousand eager children hoping to be scouted by the Senegalese National Olympic Committee.

Within minutes, the participants underwent physical and cognitive assessments, which involved analyzing over 1,000 biomechanical data points to assess their speed, acceleration, burst power, agility, and ability to change direction.

“As time passes, the hope is that this technology can help increase the chances for every aspiring athlete to have the opportunity to shine on the global stage,” Rhoades said.

Additional Intel-based technologies was used to assist the app in order to deploy the physical testing successfully, even in remote areas:

Edge devices running on Intel® Xeon® processors for video processing, real-time computer vision and biomechanical data analysis.
• Intel® Gaudi™ AI accelerators for improved efficiency of model training.

• AI models optimized with OpenVINO.
• Intel® Core™ Ultra notebooks for real-time inferencing.

Intel’s AI platform technology is responsible for taking over the hard part – analyzing, scoring and ranking each video to provide scouts, coaches and national governing bodies with a quantitative dataset of raw physical prowess to review.
And the results of the Senegal program? Of the 1,000 children who participated in the initiative, 40 showcased significant talent.