NRL

• Boston, MA, Feb. 29, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Catapult (ASX: CAT), the global leader in sports technology solutions for professional teams, today announced the expansion of its long-standing collaboration with the National Rugby League (NRL).
• NRL utilises these data and insights to inform in-game athlete performance, along with enhancing fan engagement by sharing real-time athlete data during high-intensity moments.
• Playing for the first time on American soil, all four NRL clubs will benefit from access to the Catapult ClearSky Local Positioning System already installed at Allegiant Stadium, home to the Las Vegas Raiders National Football League team and Catapult customer.
• “Catapult and the NRL have a storied partnership where technology and innovation meets Rugby League,” said Will Lopes, CEO at Catapult.

• MOORESVILLE, N.C., Feb. 29, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Consolidated Laser Technologies (CLT), a Mooresville, North Carolina-based startup defense company, announced this week the completion of its work on the U.S. Navy's emergent technology designed to improve maintenance in underwater environments.
• The $500,000 contract – CLT's first – was awarded in September 2023 and employed the U.S. Navy's novel ultra short pulse laser (USPL) surface preparation technology to assess the capability as an enhanced surface preparation tool on sensor cable connectors in subsurface environments.
• "The group shares common goals intending to increase efficiency in new builds, reduce manpower-intensive maintenance, and increase the longevity of our Navy's assets and their critical components."
• The effort was funded and supported by the U.S. Navy's Submarine Industrial Base (SIB), the Shipbuilding Industrial Base Task Force (SIB-TF), and BlueForge Alliance (BFA).

• NRL Mortgage, a reliable leader in mortgage origination, has partnered with Calque , a fintech leader enabling traditional lenders to offer buy-before-you-sell programs, to launch The Trade-In Mortgage™ in 45 states.
• By working with Calque, NRL Mortgage can offer better terms to their clients looking to switch homes.
• With Calque, NRL Mortgage empowers everyday consumers to win bids and retain wealth by seamlessly transferring their equity from one property to the next.
• “True to their mission, NRL Mortgage brings reliability and dependability back into home financing for consumers, and we look forward to The Trade-In Mortgage making a difference for their buyers.”
  Nations Reliable Lending (NRL Mortgage) is a leading nationwide mortgage company headquartered in Houston, Texas.

• With early voting set to open next week for the Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum, this is a critical time for campaigners to win over voters.
• If the same voting patterns apply to the referendum, this means more than half of Australians, particularly older voters, may have cast a vote before voting day on October 14.

What’s happening in the polls?

• According to Professor Simon Jackman’s averaging of the polls, “no” currently leads “yes” by 58% to 42% nationally.
• The rate of decline in support for “yes” continues to be about 0.75 of a percentage point a week.
• If this trend continues, the “yes” vote would sit at 39.6% on October 14, 5.5 percentage points below the “yes” vote in the republic referendum.

What’s happening in the news and social media?

• Using Meltwater data, we have seen a massive spike in Voice media coverage since Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced the referendum date at the end of August.
• In the most recent week we analysed, from September 14-21, we saw a huge jump of mentions of the Voice to Parliament (2.86 million) in print media, radio, TV and social media.
• This compares to about a quarter million mentions in the first week of the “yes” and “no” campaigns, which we documented in our last report of this series monitoring both campaigns.
• Media coverage of the Voice peaked on September 17 with 38,000 mentions, thanks to widespread coverage of the “yes” rallies that day around the country.

Who is advertising online?

• This week, we specifically turned our attention to the online advertising spending of the campaigns.
• The main online advertising spend is on Meta’s Facebook and Instagram platforms.
• In the last three months, its advertising expenditure exceeds $1.1 million, compared to just under $100,000 for Fair Australia, the leading “no” campaign organisation.
• The advertising spending data shows how drastically different the strategies of the two main campaigns are.

Referendum disinformation

• Studies show disinformation surrounding the referendum has been prevalent on X since at least March.
• To mitigate the harms, the AEC has established a disinformation register to inform citizens about the referendum process and call out falsehoods.
• We’ve identified three types of disinformation campaigns in the campaign so far.
• This disinformation type is not covered in the AEC’s register, as the organisation has no provisions to enforce truth in political advertising.
• All three types of disinformation campaigns attacking this referendum should concern us deeply because they threaten trust in our political institutions, which undermines our vibrant democracy.