The value prop for Catapult is pretty straightforward: it lets sports teams turn performance data into competitive advantage. At the top levels of professional sport, decisions are increasingly data-driven (see: Moneyball). Player load, tactical strategy, and return-to-play timelines can make or break seasons, and there are millions of dollars on the line. Pro sports is big business.

Catapult’s platform (built on wearables, video, and analytics) gives teams the ability to monitor athlete performance in real time, analyze tactical execution, and optimize player development with objectivity and precision. For sports organizations managing multi-million-dollar athlete assets, this kind of insight isn’t just helpful, it’s essential. And it’s increasingly being recognized as such.

Catapult is both a leader and pioneer in this space. Its clients include the NFL, Premier League, Bundesliga, F1, NCAA, and numerous national governing bodies. It is at least 5x the the size of its nearest competitor (Statsports). That dominance matters because scale fuels significant network effects: as more departments across a team adopt Catapult’s tools, workflows embed, data libraries expand, and switching costs rise. Over time, Catapult becomes not just a tool, but essential infrastructure.

This stickiness is reflected in an average customer tenure of around six years and a steadily rising ACV per team. More customers mean more data, which improves the product, which attracts more customers -- it's a classic flywheel. Scale also funds a superior R&D budget, strengthening the company’s moat. Crucially, Catapult owns the data it helps generate. When players transfer between teams, those teams want the data too, which makes adoption by one club a catalyst for adoption by others.

The market opportunity is pretty sizeable. Catapult currently serves around 3,500 professional teams, which management estimates to be just 30–35% of the global addressable market. The goal is to reach 5,000 teams over the medium term. Importantly, there’s still major upside within the existing customer base: only 27% of teams currently use more than one product, meaning the majority are ripe for cross-sell.

This reflects Catapult’s deliberate “land and expand” strategy. The business typically enters with its elite wearables (Performance & Health), then grows through video and analytics (Tactics & Coaching). This model seems to be working, with multi-vertical customers growing 32% in FY24.

Financially, the company’s profile has improved significantly since the current CEO Will Lopes took over. It has completed its SaaS transition, with 92% of revenue now recurring. ACV reached US$86.8 million in FY24, up 20% YoY (constant currency), with retention of 96.5%. Gross margin hit 81%, and contribution margin expanded to 46%, up from 34% a year earlier. Free cash flow turned positive for the first time, hitting $4.6 million (a $26 million turnaround from the prior year) while more or less holding costs flat.

Catapult is now Rule of 40 compliant, combining strong growth with positive margins. And it seems to have done so without unsustainable incentives or pricing tactics. The business is also relatively insulated from macroeconomic cycles; pro sports remains in demand across all market environments, and performance tech is becoming a non-negotiable investment.

Looking ahead, the company has set clear medium-term targets. It aims to grow to 5,000 pro teams, reach 50% multi-vertical penetration, keep ACV retention above 95%, and hit a 30% Management EBITDA margin. It plans to achieve this by keeping variable costs below 45% of revenue and fixed costs (G&A and R&D) under 25%. Execution against these benchmarks is starting to show: Catapult moved from -13% Rule of 40 in FY23 to 31% in 1H FY25.

Taken together, this is a business with product-market fit, durable customer relationships, strong financial fundamentals, and a clear path to scale. Catapult is a global category leader solving a critical problem in an industry that’s only becoming more analytical and performance-obsessed. It has proven it can grow, and now (finally) it’s proving it can do so profitably, with operating leverage and strategic clarity.

Will Lopes has flagged a long-term target of reaching US$1 billion in ACV, though without a defined timeline. Since adopting the subscription model, Catapult has grown ACV at a 23% CAGR. Assuming a slightly lower 20% going forward, the business would hit US$1 billion in ACV by FY38 -- about 13 years from now.

Assuming ACV approximates revenue at that point, and that management delivers on its 30% EBITDA margin target, Catapult would be generating around US$300 million in EBITDA in FY38. Applying a 12x multiple -- which is about standardfor mature, high-quality SaaS companies -- you get a US$3.6 billion terminal value. Discounted back at 10% per year, this equates to a present value of US$1.04 billion.

Assume the share count grows at 5% annually, reaching ~470 million shares by FY38. Using a 0.63 USD/AUD exchange rate, this implies a per-share value today of around A$3.51.

That's below the current market price, but I'm hesitant to lift it much further given it's already based on some bullish assumptions. At the same time, i'm not looking to sell down as the market price is still in the ball park of value and I try not to overthink valuation when the underlying business quality is high and the prospects for sustained growth seem decent.