Patriots Training Centre Expands VR and AI Capabilities
The New England Patriots have introduced virtual reality (VR), expanded networking infrastructure and new artificial intelligence (AI) applications at their training facility in Foxborough, Massachusetts. The $95 million New Balance Athletics Center covers 160,000 square feet and officially opened in late summer. The facility forms the second part of a major information technology overhaul for the professional American football team. The earlier phase included network upgrades at Gillette Stadium and across other operations run by The Kraft Group, which owns the team, stadium and several other businesses.
Michael Israel, chief information officer (CIO) of The Kraft Group, oversees technology supporting these operations. Gillette Stadium has four 10-gig circuits, with two allocated to stadium operations and two to the business. The existing infrastructure includes Cisco firewalls and networking equipment. Coaches and scouts use the network daily, including during the off-season, to prepare for the draft and pre-season. Their work involves collecting and reviewing footage from multiple sources to assess players and potential draft selections.
The new training facility was developed with NWN, a technology infrastructure provider. The investment also addresses the limitations of the previous training building, which was constructed about 30 years ago, around the time of the stadium. The older facility had become outdated and was falling behind in its technology provision. The replacement provides additional space for training activities and modern IT resources. Its technology was also intended to demonstrate the support available to prospective players beyond match days, forming part of the facilities they could consider when choosing a team.
Access to the new building uses facial recognition for players and employees instead of traditional badges. The number of meeting rooms has increased from six in the former facility to 32. Every room is equipped with Cisco Webex, Wi-Fi and network connectivity. The building also has a professional-grade broadcast network. Media teams have separate wireless and wired connections to support their network requirements.
A dedicated VR room allows coaches and players to review footage recorded at the practice fields from an on-field perspective. The system provides a near-real representation of their performance, enabling them to examine individual actions and identify missed opportunities. It offers an alternative to classroom-based discussions that focus on theoretical aspects of training.
The room is designed to reproduce a life-size view of the playing field. A screen spans the width of the field, while 100-inch screens along the sides support PowerPoint presentations and the marking up of plays. The system uses dedicated video-storage hardware and combines on-site resources with cloud-based services, including NFL video. The network contains more than three petabytes of video and photographic data.
AI adoption at the facility is subject to controls intended to balance practical applications with the need to manage risks and preserve innovation. The Kraft Group has introduced staff training and other safeguards as AI has become part of its operations. One application assesses food consumption at the facility to improve forecasts of future requirements and reduce waste.
The organisation is also evaluating a video-based AI system that remains in a pilot phase. It is designed to ingest footage from across the league and allow coaches to ask questions about game recordings. Scouts could also use the system to make enquiries about prospects under assessment. These applications remain distinct from the food-consumption system already introduced at the facility.
Supporting AI applications requires robust network infrastructure and enhancements to the graphics processing units (GPUs) in servers. Israel has indicated that these upgrades might have been necessary to remain competitive even without the new building. The facility’s technology infrastructure was designed to support the organisation’s technology requirements beyond the initial project.
The National Football League (NFL) imposes specific restrictions on AI use. Applications used by the team or stadium must be registered with the league and go through an approval process. The NFL also retains ownership of game footage and certain related media, with rules governing their use. These requirements affect how the organisation can deploy AI systems that process league footage.
The Kraft Group has also restricted the use of personal AI tools within its internal network for a little more than a year. Its policy is to use enterprise versions of services such as Microsoft Copilot, OpenAI and Claude when those tools are adopted. This forms part of the organisation’s wider approach to controlling AI use across its operations.
Token consumption is another area of oversight. The company has introduced controls to manage how extensively staff can use AI models and the associated resources. Developers and other high-end users receive different levels of token access from employees with less demanding requirements. Usage is audited and monitored, while staff receive training in effective prompting. The controls are intended to limit unnecessary consumption and manage the cost of using AI models.
The approach reflects the financial limits faced by the CIO, who supports the football team and other businesses within The Kraft Group. AI use must remain within available budgets rather than allowing unrestricted expenditure. The organisation is therefore combining new technology applications with controls on access, usage and costs.
