|
Meet the CAN Team
Senior AI Engineer: Thom Flaherty
Early this year, Thom become a Senior AI Engineer at Contemporary Analysis.
Thom Flaherty has spent 13 years building data infrastructure, shipping models, and convincing people to stop emailing spreadsheets. He's the kind of engineer who can walk into a company with no real data, science, or ML practice and lay the foundations from scratch.
Off the clock, he performs as Thom Clarity, a hardware-only electronic musician improvising textured sets across ambient, drone, house, and techno. It's the same instinct in both worlds: hands on the gear, building in the moment.
Thom is currently reverse engineering the Macarena.
|
|
|
And rumor has it, he will be at the Tech Omaha Summer Party this evening. If you see him, make sure to say hi! |
Around the Sports Data World
Last week I provided an action-packed sports data issue in honor of the CWS and World Cup, so here we go!
Off Side: 2026 FIFA World Cup, powered by Data Analysis
NetSI Sport, Northeastern's Network Science research hub specializing in data and sport, is publishing real-time analysis of the FIFA World Cup.
Here are highlights from a few of my favorites:
|
Sports Analytics in Our Own Backyard
Hudl celebrated its 20th anniversary last week with Hudl Week 2026, bringing together more than 1,800 employees, customers, and leaders from 27 countries and 38 states.
What started as a project between three UNL students is now a platform used by hundreds of thousands of teams worldwide, from youth leagues to professional organizations across dozens of sports.
Hudl built its reputation on video analysis, opponent scouting, recruiting tools, and GPS athlete tracking. Their portfolio expanded significantly with the acquisitions of Wyscout and Statsbomb, adding deep global football data coverage to the platform.
Now they're moving into AI. Earlier this month, Hudl launched a natural language AI assistant built into Hudl Signal, their elite athlete monitoring platform. Users can ask plain-language questions, like:
- "Which players had the highest load this week?"
- or "Flag anyone with an acute:chronic ratio above 1.3,"
And get instant answers. Sports analytics has the same problem we see across industries:
You already know what you need to know about your athletes. The problem has never been the data. It has been the time and technical skills required to extract a specific answer from it. - Hudl Read the SPN article on Hudl's 20th anniversary celebration or explore Hudl Signal’s New AI Assistant
|
AI-Powered Football [Soccer] Intelligence
According to Jan Wendt, footballers "might be the best tracked profession behind astronauts and pilots."
Wendt is the CEO and cofounder of PLAIER, an AI-Powered Football Intelligence, a platform that helps managers of over 40 clubs world wide make sense of the massive amounts of data collected each match.
Just on the pitch, around 150 data points are collected per player, per minute, per match. You do that math.
PLAIER is using this data to build predictive AI for football.
This was just one story featured on the Naked Scientist Podcast - Fever pitch: the science of the Football World Cup.
If you're interested in learn more about:
- The physics of the football spin
- The psychological impact of the fans
- and How to track a players performance condition
Give this 30 minute episode a listen!
|
Connect with Omaha's Data+AI Community
Tech Omaha Summer Party 2026
TONIGHT, June 25th at the Slowdown
This event is FREE for anyone who works in tech or loves tech. It's a great chance to meet new people, reconnect with old friends, and see how awesome our tech community is. The sponsors have generously offered to provide food and drink for this event.
RSVP for Free
Nebraska Data and Analytics Forum
The Data Journey That's Powering OPPD's Future
TONIGHT, June 25th at Omaha Public Power District
OPPD will be sharing about how they are leveraging data to Power Omaha's future. This will cover the creation of their first data strategy, the launch of a formal data governance council, and the implementation of a data catalog and data platform.
RSVP on Meetup
OMA x AI
By UNO
Tuesday, June 30th
"At OMA x AI, we're focused really on the intersection of different industries with small businesses, with the education sector and nonprofits. Because that's really where innovation happens." - Jason Coleman, UNO's associate vice chancellor for Innovative and Learning Centric Initiatives on the TEN Podcast.
Get Your Ticket Today
|
Are you doing data work we should know about?
Did you know we have over 600 data and AI enthusiasts on this email list? I know many of you personally, and KNOW many of you are working on really interesting data projects.
So, if you want to get the word out about what you're building, send it to me! Whether it's a model you're proud of, a problem you're solving, or an application you think others should see, we want to feature your work. And it's a chance to get in front of 600 peers.
Don't leave your data sitting on the bench,
|
|
NATE WATSON
CEO, Contemporary Analysis
|
|
|
Was this email forwarded to you?
Join our weekly HIGHLY TECHNICAL Newsletter for your weekly dose of AI, Tech, and Data Science.
|
WAYS TO WORK TOGETHER
Let us build your Data Solution
We help businesses of all sizes to increase visibility, drive more traffic and improve commercial success.
Schedule a Call
|
|
Enroll for Classes at ODSA
Come learn from 6-9pm, what a data scientist did from 8-5pm”
Talk to an Advisor about your next steps!
|
|
|
|
You're receiving this email because you signed up to receive our Data Science resources from Contemporary Analysis or the Omaha Data Science Academy. If you would like to stop getting our weekly newsletter, but stay on our other lists, update your Preferences or Unsubscribe
1402 Jones Street, Omaha, NE 68102
|
|
|
