DUCKEYE™ Strategy Memo

Mission Statement

DUCKEYE is a mat analytics platform that helps you master wrestling by watching your every move and giving you personalized feedback. It is powered by vision models trained on curated video datasets from Ohio State and Ohio RTC.

We accelerate coaching and learning by giving immediate feedback and skipping hours of scrubbing through footage. DUCKEYE tracks every player's - and opponent's - strengths, weaknesses, and tendencies.

Data generated on DUCKEYE is the sole property of its user. We do not share personal information with others.

DUCKEYE, built by Buckeyes, will be one of the reasons Ohio State rises to #1 in 2027. Once we do, everyone else gets access to it.

North Star

Ohio State is the proving ground. If DUCKEYE™ is good enough to help the best program in the country win a national championship, it is good enough for every wrestling program in America. That's the sequence. That's the plan.

After we prove it, we open the doors. A high school program in rural Ohio gets the same AI precision that just won Ohio State a title. Not the same budget. The same intelligence. That is the point.

Executive Summary

DUCKEYE™ is a mat analytics platform purpose-built for wrestling. We watch every move, detect every position, and deliver personalized feedback automatically - powered by vision models trained on curated footage from Ohio State and Ohio RTC, the most competitive wrestling programs in the country.

Coaches currently spend 3–5 hours per week scrubbing through footage manually. DUCKEYE™ eliminates that. Upload a match; get structured analysis in minutes. Every position, every tendency, every pattern - quantified, organized, and actionable.

Who We Are

DUCKEYE is a coaching intelligence platform built by people who understand both technology and athletics. We are engineers, analysts, wrestlers, and coaches at the top of our leagues.

We are precise, intelligent, and uncompromising. Our competitive advantage is seeing patterns others miss - better and faster over time. We are building DUCKEYE because we want to give every wrestler, coach, mom, and dad access to elite-level coaching intelligence.

Market Opportunity

The Problem

Wrestling is a technically complex sport where millimeters determine outcomes. Coaches at every level understand that position, stance transitions, and tactical tendencies decide matches - yet they lack tools to systematically analyze them.

• Coaches spend 3–5 hours/week on manual film review - repetitive, time-consuming work.
• Pattern recognition across a full season requires reviewing hundreds of hours of footage.
• Generic platforms built for football (Hudl) are structurally wrong for wrestling analysis.
• Budget disparities mean smaller programs never had access to dedicated film analysts.
• Coaching insights remain locked in individuals - impossible to quantify, compare, or scale.

Our Solution

DUCKEYE™ ingests match footage and returns structured, personalized intelligence immediately - no scrubbing, no frame-by-frame review, no wasted hours. Our vision models are trained on curated datasets from Ohio State and Ohio RTC, the most technically demanding wrestling programs in the country.

1. 01Upload match footage via web or direct integration.
2. 02AI engine processes video, detects positions and transitions with 85%+ accuracy.
3. 03Immediate personalized feedback surfaces for each athlete - their positions, tendencies, and patterns.
4. 04Opponent scouting reports are generated automatically from all available footage.
5. 05Season-long data accumulates, revealing patterns invisible to human reviewers.

Market Size

The US wrestling market is larger and more structured than commonly assumed.

Our initial beachhead is NCAA D1 and high-performing D2/D3 programs - coaches who feel the pain most acutely and have budget authority to act.

Product Strategy

Core Capabilities

DUCKEYE™ is not a generic video platform. Every feature exists because a wrestling coach asked for it.

Product Roadmap

Go-to-Market

Ideal Customer Profile

Our primary ICP is the head coach or assistant coach at a competitive wrestling program who is responsible for film analysis and opponent preparation.

Acquisition Channels

1. 01Direct sales: Personal outreach to D1/D2 programs. Target 5 new outreach contacts per week.
2. 02Coaching clinics & conventions: NWCA Convention (December), Regional Wrestling Clinics.
3. 03Referral program: Each customer refers two peers within their conference.
4. 04Content marketing: SEO articles on wrestling analytics, coaching strategy, and film study.
5. 05Demo-first model: Free 30-day trial for any program - zero friction to start.
6. 06Podcast outreach: Sponsorship and guest appearances on wrestling coaching podcasts.

Competitive Landscape

There are no direct competitors purpose-built for wrestling analytics. The landscape consists of adjacent players that coaches use imperfectly:

Business Model

DUCKEYE™ is a SaaS platform sold on annual subscriptions to programs, with per-seat licensing for larger coaching staffs. We do not charge per analysis or per match - unlimited usage drives adoption and word-of-mouth.

Pricing

All tiers include a 30-day free trial. No credit card required. Conversion to paid is targeted at 30%+ of trials.

Technology & Moat

DUCKEYE™'s technical advantage compounds over time. The more footage we analyze, the better our models become. The better our models, the more coaches trust us. The more coaches trust us, the more footage we receive.

Our foundation is unique: vision models trained on curated video datasets from Ohio State and Ohio RTC - elite programs that represent the highest technical standard in American wrestling. No competitor starts with this. Replicating it would take years.

• Vision models trained on curated footage from Ohio State and Ohio RTC - the most technically demanding programs in the country.
• Computer vision built specifically for wrestling positions and transitions, not repurposed from football or generic sports models.
• 85%+ positional detection accuracy - independently validated against human analyst ground truth.
• Immediate feedback pipeline: analysis delivered without manual review or scrubbing.
• Continuous learning: each new match improves model performance without manual retraining.
• Wrestling ontology: a structured vocabulary of positions, moves, and transitions that no competitor has formalized.

Data & Privacy

Data ownership is a first principle, not a legal afterthought.

Team & Hiring

DUCKEYE is built by people who are at the top of their respective leagues - in athletics and in technology. This is not a software team that discovered wrestling. This is a wrestling-first team that builds elite software.

We are engineers, analysts, wrestlers, and coaches. Precise, intelligent, and uncompromising. We are building DUCKEYE because we want to give every wrestler, coach, mom, and dad access to the coaching intelligence that was previously only available to the best-funded programs in America.

2026 hiring priorities:

1. 01Senior ML Engineer - deep experience in video understanding or pose estimation.
2. 02Customer Success Manager - sports background required; will own onboarding and retention.
3. 03Sales Development Rep - outbound focus; wrestling network strongly preferred.
4. 04Product Designer - systems thinker with experience on data-heavy coaching or analytics tools.

Stakeholder Alignment

DUCKEYE™ works because every person committed to it wins when the company wins. This section documents the specific value proposition for each stakeholder - what they get, what they give, and why the alignment is genuine, not manufactured.

Tom Ryan - Head Coach, Ohio State

Tom is a championship coach who understands competitive advantage. DUCKEYE™ gives him that edge before his competitors know it exists.

Tom's ROI: 50 hours/year invested. In return: $30K/year in software value, competitive edge against top-5 programs, and $3.75M–7.5M in equity upside on exit. He doesn't compromise his core interests - DUCKEYE™ advances OSU, advances wrestling, and advances his legacy.

Anthony Ralph - Operations Director, OSU

Anthony is operational and pragmatic. He sees a tool that makes his job easier and makes OSU more competitive. That's his primary motivation.

• OSU looks cutting-edge to recruits - program is modern and forward-thinking.
• Coaches trust Anthony more - he brought meaningful innovation.
• Network expansion: connected to startup founder + DLA Piper leadership.
• Potential equity: 0.1–0.25% if contribution grows beyond Year 1 (up to $500K+ on exit).

Frank Ryan - Lead Investor, DLA Piper Co-Chair

Frank is a sophisticated investor who sees a rare opportunity: a family-backed, coach-validated startup in sports tech - a market he understands deeply - at the exact right moment in AI adoption.

Beyond capital, Frank's network is worth $500K+ in saved business development time. His DLA Piper relationships open doors to Hudl (potential acquirer), ESPN, FloWrestling, Nike, and Asics - and his legal expertise means DUCKEYE™ gets a professional governance foundation from day one.

Inesh - The Founder

Building a $100M+ company in a category that didn't exist. Proving venture can work outside traditional markets. Becoming a founder with a real exit story.

Alignment Matrix

What makes this compelling is that every WIIFM is true. No stakeholder has to compromise their core values or interests. Tom doesn't have to stop coaching to help. Frank doesn't have to leave his firm. Anthony doesn't have to take on a second job. They all win through the same outcome: DUCKEYE™ succeeding.

Capital Ask

This addendum converts strategy into an immediate operating plan for Tom Ryan. It defines the capital ask, financing structure, and execution timeline with clear ownership and deadlines.

Part 1 - Seed Capital Ask (Q2 2026)

Cap Table

Ownership and dilution assumptions are explicit below so every stakeholder can see where equity stands at each financing stage.

Part 2 - Tom Ryan Specific Action Plan

The asks below are concrete and time-bound. This is an operating commitment, not advisory theater.

Marketing Strategy (2026 - 2028)

This section defines DUCKEYE™ go-to-market execution across ambassador marketing, athlete NIL partnerships, customer acquisition, and thought leadership distribution.

Tom Ryan as Strategic Advisor + Brand Ambassador

Tom's official role combines strategic product input with outward market credibility. Compensation remains equity-based (0.75%) with no additional cash compensation.

Athlete NIL Partnerships

NIL strategy creates authentic athlete proof while directly improving product quality through data and content loops.

• 2026 NIL budget target: $16K-$22K.
• 2027 NIL budget target: $30K-$50K with monthly retainer model.
• ROI threshold: 1 customer acquired from NIL content generally repays annual NIL spend.

Customer Acquisition Funnel

Funnel design is deliberately narrow and high-intent: awareness first, coached demos second, conversion through guided trials.

• Trial conversion target: 25% (5 of 20).
• Demo to trial target: 50%.
• Waitlist to demo target: 10%.

Marketing Budget Allocation (2026)

KPIs & Metrics

Timeline & Milestones

2027 Expansion Program

• Combat sports extension pilot (BJJ first), then broader grappling categories.
• Conference strategy: 2-3 sponsorship activations with demo-led booths.
• Speaking strategy: 5+ Tom sessions plus 3+ founder-led talks.
• Distribution partnerships: FloWrestling, coaching podcasts, selective media.
• Objective: 20+ active programs and 2-3x YoY customer growth.

Technical Implementation Plan (MVP)

This execution plan covers MVP delivery from June 2026 to February 2027 with a production-grade architecture, clear staffing model, and measurable launch criteria.

System Architecture

ML Pipeline

Development Timeline (9 Months)

Engineering Team Plan

Infrastructure Costs

Year-1 technical burn (modeled): contractor ~$90K + infra/tools ~$3.5K + labeling ~$8K = ~$101.5K total.

Testing Approach

MVP Feature Set

Security & Compliance

• AES-256 encryption for video/data at rest + TLS 1.3 in transit.
• JWT authentication + API rate limiting and key validation.
• FERPA-aligned athlete data handling and DPA coverage.
• Daily backups, 30-day retention, and access audit logs.

Monitoring & Metrics

Launch Readiness Checklist

Financial Projections

Projections are based on bottom-up modeling from pipeline data and comparable SaaS benchmarks. Conservative estimates; does not include expansion revenue or multi-year contracts.

Risks & Mitigations

2026 Priorities

We operate with extreme focus. Three things matter in 2026. Everything else is noise.