Mona Hafez, OrbitHub’s co-founder and CEO, holds up the webpage for their newly launched mobile app called OrbitPlay.The city recently partnered with a Centretown-based startup to encourage residents to get active and maximize the use of public sports facilities.
Today’s hectic lifestyles can make it difficult to join competitive leagues and spend time commuting back and forth to games, practices and tournaments, says co-founder Mona Hafez.
OrbitPlay connects users with people around them ready to play anything from board games to practicing parkour, an extreme sport similar to obstacle course training that uses one’s urban environment instead of actual equipment.
The mobile app matches people for activities instantly and shows users nearby playing facilities, including tennis courts or rock climbing gyms.
That’s where the partnership with the City of Ottawa comes in, says Hafez.
The city partnered with OrbitPlay to optimize the usage of public tennis courts by piloting its new mobile app, says Dan Chenier in an email sent to Centretown News. Chenier is the general manager of parks, recreation and cultural services with the city.
“Residents will be able to reserve specific public tennis courts at nine designated multi-court sites,” writes Chenier.
Local tennis players who may be pressed for time will be able to reserve 30 minutes of court time at one of the designated sites, otherwise they can play on a first-come, first-served basis.
The exact cost of booking a public court with the city has still not been determined, says Hafez.
Currently, OrbitPlay is a free app available for Android devices, with an iOS version coming out this summer.
The company wanted to expand its client base beyond its current niche market of tennis and racquet sport players, says Hafez. The startup also runs OrbitHub, an online club management system for tennis and squash players.
It currently serves the National Capital Tennis Association.
Hafez started the management service with her co-founder Brooke Stephens five years ago.
After launching OrbitHub, Hafez says her team noticed that a lot of people just want to play sports socially. This includes recreational players who don’t want to join an official club or enter a competitive league.
“That led us to expand our platform to support a bunch of different activities and take some focus off the competitive side,” says Hafez.
“The biggest challenge is (still) coordinating your schedules, to find out where and when to play,” says Hafez, explaining players often have to go back and forth, exchanging numerous messages before actually scheduling a match.
“With the mobile app you see everyone who’s available, and you can turn your visibility on and off. If someone is visible that means they’re ready to play.”
Users can send invites, alerting other players with notifications.
Once players accept the invitation, they can use the app’s scheduler, which helps them easily set up meeting times, Hafez explains.
There is definitely a local market for the app, says Ron Kunstadt, business representative for the NCTA and vice-president of Kunstadt Sports, a store specializing in bike, ski and tennis equipment.
“Ottawa has a very strong tennis community with a big population of players and a lot of beautiful clubs that are well-maintained and aren’t terribly expensive,” says Kunstadt.
Kunstadt says he thinks OrbitPlay could encourage tennis players to take advantage of these facilities. This includes over 200 courts run by the city, which are accessible to players in terms of cost, says Kunstadt.
For people intimidated by official clubs and leagues, OrbitPlay lets average players meet new people and socialize through a common love of sports, says Hafez.
“There is a market that is underserved right now around social and recreational sports. Sure, there are leagues you can join, but there is no way for you to connect with people on your own.”
Hafez says she has personally experienced this difficulty.
That’s what motivated her to create tennisOrbit, the original version of OrbitHub.
“I had moved to a new city for a job, and I had nobody to play tennis with . . . at the time there wasn’t a social network to connect tennis players.”
She says this app is fulfilling this void and has become her team’s passion project for the next five years.
“We just want people to go out there and be social and active. I think a lot of people have a need for a solution that lets them play on their own terms, on their own time.”