'Industry first' as Legend plans to make its data available as part of Open Data Initiative

Legend Club Management Systems will enable all of its customers to have the ability to open their data for collaboration with third parties.

The announcement is an industry first and is seen as a landmark moment for the OpenActive collaboration, funded by Sport England and led by the Open Data Institute (ODI).

OpenActive is a community-led initiative designed to help people in England get active using open data.

One of its aims is to make physical activity opportunities easier for people to discover, by improving access to information online and offline.

Legend will adopt the open data standards developed by OpenActive and drive its 1,700 locations around the world to "maximising the potential of collaboration" with third parties.

Sean Maguire, managing director of Legend, said: “We live in an era of rapid change where operators cannot be sure where the next innovation will come from with the potential to grow their business.

“We want to make collaboration a matter of business strategy and choice, not questions about technical possibilities.

“We have made this technically possible for all, so it is up to operators to decide how they wish to take forward the collaborations that have the potential to grow the reach of the sector.”

Dave Newton, mass markets director of Sport England, added: “Our mission is to create an active nation, enabling everyone in the community to be active, irrespective of age, gender or social-demographic background.

“Supporting the sector to harness the power of digital innovation is a core part of fulfilling that strategy. We are therefore delighted to be working in partnership with Legend to support such a large proportion of the sector to open its data in this way, and make collaboration with third parties a question of business strategy, not technical possibilities.”

“OpenActive has made a lot of progress in the past two years, but there are even more exciting moments ahead.”

The collaboration between Legend, Sport England and the ODI was brokered by ukactive CEO Steven Ward.

“I have had a long-term commitment to supporting the sector to realise its digital potential," he said.

“We have made more progress on digital and innovation in the past three years than in the 30 years that preceded it. Collaborations such as these indicate that we are now presented with a range of technical partners in the sector that form a digital backbone that will set us up for growth in years to come.”