Summary

Whilst clubs obsess over player performance data, they're ignoring massive off-field risks in transfers - a £6.3bn blindspot. ProDiligent’s AI-powered platform introduces the Athlete Impact Score (AIS) - the first holistic, boardroom-ready assessment of an athlete’s total value, including basic performance, brand, risk, financial impacts and commercial upside. It’s the foundation of a new category: Athlete Impact Intelligence. With oversubscribed trials and a regulatory tailwind, ProDiligent is set to become as essential as performance analytics.

Hello, Hi Visionaries!

Picture this: You're standing in the boardroom of a Premier League club. The scouts have just presented their shortlist of potential signings. Stats? Check. Videos? Check. Performance metrics? Triple check. But then someone asks the question that makes everyone shift uncomfortably: "What do we actually know about these players off the field? Any media red flags? How does this player align to our club values? What’s the commercial opportunity? How is their reputation off the pitch?"

Crickets.

This scenario plays out weekly across football clubs, and it's costing the sport hundreds of millions in bad transfers,  brand damage, and missed opportunity. Enter ProDiligent. A UK-based AI platform that's about to change the game entirely.

The Million-Pound Blind Spot

Here's the thing that'll make your head spin: Premier League revenues smashed records last season at £6.3 billion, yet clubs are still making transfer decisions like it's 1999. They'll spend months analysing a player's passing accuracy but minutes checking a player’s off field influence. It's like buying a company without any due diligence.

The numbers don't lie. Clubs below the top flight are bleeding cash, financial and reputational risks are no longer theoretical, they're existential. With the incoming independent football regulator, this “hope-for-the-best” model is simply unsustainable.

Enter the Game Changer

ProDiligent isn't another player analytics platform. It reframes an entire conversation.. While everyone else is obsessing over expected goals and heat maps, ProDiligent's founded off back of a industry leaders cohort group (including current and former football CEOs, Integrity leaders and scouting heads) that quickly realised they were all missing the elephant in the room: A true holistic measure of athlete value has to measure what happens off the pitch just as much as what happens on it.

The platform combines credit and financial services frameworks and uses AI to dive deep into the below crucial areas to return its proprietary AIS score:

• Personal Image and Brand Impact
  
  Measures media sentiment, public perception, community involvement, quantifying an athlete’s personality, lifestyle, habits, culture and influence.
  
   the right person to sign isn’t anecdotal — it’s analysable.
  

• Risk Assessment & Mitigation
  
  Identifies adverse media patterns linked to behavioural, legal, or reputational risks; AI flags potential reputation risk exposure, early warning signs and potential volatility - from in-depth public records, social media blow-ups to public legal red flags.
  
   Not all exposure is upside.
  

• Commercial Value & Endorsement Potential
  
  Assesses an athlete’s current and forecasted ability to drive revenue — including sponsorship appeal, merchandise uplift, brand value uplift and monetisable fan engagement.
  
   It’s not just how they play. It’s what they’re worth.
  

• Basic On-Field Performance & Potential
  
  Tracks player metrics across valuation, availability and player trajectory, including match impact, physical outputs, injury history and patterns.
  
   This is the foundation — but not the whole story.

The Historical Precedent

This isn’t some moonshot. It’s overdue.

When performance analytics arrived in football, many scoffed. Today, no club competes without it. ProDiligent’s Athlete Impact Score will follow the same path, from novel to non-negotiable.

Now you can't run a club without it.

The credit scoring industry faced similar scepticism in the 1960s when Fair Isaac Corporation introduced FICO scores. "Why do we need a number to tell us if someone can pay back a loan?" bankers scoffed. Fast forward 60 years, and you can't buy a house without one.

European football revenue has exploded from €28.9 billion in 2018-19 to an expected €39.1 billion in 2024-25. With that kind of capital at stake, making eight-figure bets without holistic intelligence is no longer tenable.

The Competitive Edge

Here's where it gets interesting: ProDiligent isn’t just about avoiding risk. It’s about anticipating it. Offering the first-of-its-kind platform focused on off-field due diligence that complements club’s on-field strategy. Unlocking a hidden advantage in today’s competitive landscape. Unlike raw data dumps, ProDiligent delivers executive-ready insights: AI-calibrated, C-suite ready formatted, and immediately actionable. It’s built specifically for decision-makers to: accelerate transfer market decisions, drive operational and cost efficiencies, Identify and triage next top talent. All whilst having the club’s brand, reputation, and investments protected in mind. 

This is the new standard for football intelligence. Smarter decisions, beyond the pitch.

While some clubs are still googling press clippings, manual research, hiring expensive resources, early adopters are receiving their new digital evaluation report that looks like they were built by McKinsey, in real-time within under minutes.

And yes, trials are already oversubscribed across the Premier League, Championship, Scottish Premiership, and League One.

When you’re oversubscribed before full launch, you’ve clearly hit a nerve.

The Athlete's Mindset Moment

Elite athletes know preparation separates them from the might have been. They wouldn't step onto the pitch without studying your opponent's weaknesses, knowing the weather conditions, or understanding the referee's tendencies. So why would clubs spend £50 million on a player without knowing their complete profile?

ProDiligent brings that same mindset to transfer strategy. No assumptions, no shortcuts, and no surprises.

What This Means for Business

The sports analytics market is projected to rocket from $5.8 billion in 2025 to $31.4 billion by 2032. That's a compound annual growth like you've never seen.

For those building in this space, ProDiligent's success offers three key lessons:

1. Find the blind spot everyone's ignoring - Off-field due diligence was hiding in plain sight whilst everyone chased the latest performance metric.

2. Build for decision-makers, not just analysts - C-suite executives don't want 47 page reports; they want clear, actionable insights that help them make better decisions faster.

3. Anticipate regulation before it arrives - By building compliance features before they're mandatory, ProDiligent positioned itself as essential rather than optional supporting new regulations such as the IFR.

The Expansion Play

Starting in the UK was smart. Established market, regulatory clarity, and clubs with deep pockets. But the real opportunity lies in the global rollout. European clubs need GDPR compliance, MLS teams are flush with Apple TV money, and emerging markets desperately need governance tools as their leagues mature.

It's textbook market expansion: dominate your home turf, then export your advantage worldwide.

The Bottom Line

ProDiligent isn’t another analytics platform. It’s the first Athlete Impact Intelligence platform with a mission to set the new industry standard. 

The Athlete Impact Score is to transfers what FICO is to credit. A single, holistic score built for decision-makers, not data jockeys.

For brands, investors, and startups watching this space. The message is clear. The future belongs to platforms that combine vertical expertise with horizontal innovation. ProDiligent took credit scoring principles, financial services frameworks and applied them to football recruitment and transfers. What other industries are ripe for similar cross-pollination?

In the next decade, athlete capital will be managed like any other high-value asset: strategically, proactively, and transparently.

ProDiligent is building the operating system to power that future. The beautiful game just got a whole lot smarter.