ChronoTrack – RunSignUp: The Open Example

One of the most interesting aspects of the recent ChronoTrack-Athlinks-RunSignUp announcement is it is built on an open foundation.

The companies are collaborating to allow their mutual customers choice in meeting their race needs. This means timers and their races will be able to mix-and-match what fits them best.

One of the most frequent comments we have received since the announcement is: “But don’t you both do the same thing? You both have registration systems. You both have Results systems. You both have photo systems. Therefore you must be competitors and someone has to win.”

The reality of the world is that customers have diverse needs and single vendor, lock-in types of solutions forcing an entire stack does not encourage innovation and best of breed. In fact customers are increasingly demanding non-exclusive contracts and saying no to multi-year lock-in deals that can result in lawsuits.

But before you think it is entirely altruistic, by partnering we can actually both increase sales. By offering a better, complete, more cost effective solution for a customer we will both win more business. Sure some people might choose one of us over the other for one of our services, but that will balance out.

And this really is an Open Partnership. It is built on an Open API, and it is non-exclusive. RunSignUp is completely committed to a vendor agnostic approach and will work with any company in any area if they have a strong desire and there is customer demand. Our partnership with ChronoTrack does not mean we will abandon other Chip or results companies or registration companies we collaborate with. We serve our customers, and we will keep it that way.