# Sideline Sports: refactoring and new features on one track

> Sideline Sports had a stalled Angular application behind XPS Network. A senior team under a tech lead took over the frontend and kept features shipping.

- Canonical: https://techmates.io/en/case-studies/xps-network
- Client: XPS Network
- Industry: Sports technology
- Published: 2026-08-19
- Services: Custom software development
- Technology: Web and mobile platform

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## A coaching platform whose replacement had stalled

XPS Network is the coaching platform of Sideline Sports, a company that has built sports software for two decades. Coaches and sports organizations use it to communicate and to reach the performance data behind their decisions.

The company was replacing an aging Angular application. Limited internal capacity and a string of freelancers had left the replacement only partly working. An early architecture decision had grown into technical debt, errors recurred, and new features waited.

### What coaches and organizations needed

- Uninterrupted access to communication and performance data
- An application that behaves the same way every day
- New functionality without waiting for a full rebuild

### What the takeover had to work around

- A replacement that only partly worked
- Technical debt from an early architecture decision
- No stable team: limited in-house expertise and inconsistent freelance delivery

## Refactor the old code and ship features at the same time

We put together a dedicated team of senior frontend developers under a technical lead and set up daily communication with Sideline Sports. The team analyzed the codebase first, then split the work into two tracks: refactor the legacy system, and keep developing new features.

Product progress therefore never waited for a technical reset. Architecture and stability work ran in the same delivery process as the functionality coaches and organizations were asking for.

### One team instead of fragmented delivery

A senior frontend team, a technical lead, daily contact with the client and a codebase assessment replaced scattered freelance work with one coordinated working model.

### Stability and features in one plan

The plan paired refactoring of the existing system with continued feature development. Stability, architecture and product functionality moved forward together.

## Features shipped faster and the application settled down

| Metric | Before | After |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Feature delivery | Development had slowed and new features were delayed | New features reported as delivered faster |
| Application stability and functionality | Frequent errors in a partially functional replacement | Reported as improved |
| Revenue during the wider growth period |  | 40-fold increase reported |

> The Techmates team has been responsible for the development of the frontend of our website and mobile app for over a year now. During that time, they have become our true partners, delivering excellent and quality work, with seamless communication, and most importantly, always accommodating our requirements.
> — Agust Thorkelsson, Co-Founder & CEO, Sideline Sports

## The technical work was one part of a larger growth story

Sideline Sports gained a more stable application, technical leadership and a team that repairs old code while shipping new features. Those are the direct outcomes of the engineering work.

The project record also reports a 40-fold increase in revenue over the same period. That period included strategic marketing as well as technical delivery, so the figure describes the company's growth, not the modernization alone.