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Many brands use the U.S. Open to entertain clients or put up flashy signage. IBM does both, but its involvement goes much deeper. Behind the scenes, the century-old tech titan is the invisible hand shaping the fan experience, powering the U.S. Open app, and engaging 14 million fans worldwide. In the process, IBM is making the case that sports might be the perfect playground for AI integration.
The servers behind each serve
From a fan’s perspective, it seems simple. You open the app, check the score and maybe watch a highlight or two. But making that experience work requires IBM and the USTA to process a mountain of data in real time, using AI alongside human review to balance speed and accuracy. One new metric, Serve Quality, analyzes 21 data points across a player’s body and racquet 50 times per second, generating roughly 4.6 million data points per match and more than 1.2 billion throughout the tournament. And then there’s the match chat, an AI bot that lets users ask conversational questions about the sport, like “what is the record for x?”
Users appear to be embracing these features, if the numbers are any indication: More than 14 million unique devices engaged with U.S. Open digital platforms in 2025, generating nearly 47 million visits, up 19% year over year.
So why does the USTA need IBM to help run a tennis tournament? To understand that, you have to recognize that the U.S. Open isn’t simply a sporting event. It’s a massive, temporary business operation with millions of customers, enormous amounts of data, and a three-week deadline. That comes with a litany of challenges, from security and bandwidth to content production and infrastructure, that require the scale and experience of a company like IBM.
The USTA is a few-hundred-person team that’s expected to scale monumentally during those three weeks each year. With IBM’s help, however, it can deploy AI-powered tools to streamline infrastructure management, optimize costs, enhance content production workflows, and improve operational resilience. For example, the USTA’s small editorial team uses bespoke AI tools to generate match summaries, which humans then review and edit, increasing the team’s content production capacity by 300%.
On top of that, an operation as large as the U.S. Open comes with major security risks, and IBM plays a key role in deterring them. According to a spokesperson, IBM protects against nearly 500 million suspicious requests targeting the USTA’s infrastructure and digital platforms. Its AI agents help identify, categorize and prioritize potential threats, allowing the team to respond faster and better protect the USTA’s assets.
Rallying fans around the world
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