The PlayerData Edge Air is a wearable sports-tech device that coaches and athletes use for capturing industry leading performance tracking data. It's half the size of any competitor offering - so it was a tremendous challenge for our industrial designers to achieve this form factor whilst including GPS, LPS, an IMU, and a long lasting battery.
Product images courtesy of PlayerData
Following a quick round of sketches, our industrial design team quickly moved to CAD after a concept direction was confirmed with PlayerData. Developing the product architecture of the device early was critical for validating the ambitious size requirements. Designing the internal layout allowed our team to plan how the electronics would fit together in such a small space. A risk flagged early was the interference of signals coming from the GPS, LPS and IMU units. This was quickly overcome by constructing a new layout that used a bespoke custom shaped battery to define the internal architecture.
Single button press to wake all units
Previous Edge unit vs. Edge Air
The Edge Air sits proudly in the 2026 Rot Dot Product Design Award hall of fame. It's an excellent result to wrap up a challenging product development project. A milestone sports-tech product achievement for PlayerData, and esteemed external validation of i4PD's product design process.
The product had been such a success, that even one year after the project launch in 2025, the demand for the Edge Air still outweighs the supply of units.
