The primary focus of SAS, whose sports division has worked with the likes of ice hockey team Los Angeles Kings, basketball side Orlando Magic, baseball outfit New York Mets and Major League Soccer, will be athlete performance for the COC.

"Our initial focus will be on what we call player analytics," SAS President Cameron Dow told The Canadian Press.

"It’s a lot more than a marketing partnership.

"It was more around how could we actually work with the Canadian Olympic Committee and the Olympic team to actually make a difference and drive results?"

Canada’s Olympic team used advanced data analysis for the first time at last year’s Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, where they equalled their best performance at a non-boycotted Games with 22 medals - four golds, three silvers and 15 bronzes.

Financial analysts from Canadian Tire, an automotive parts and accessories stores company which sponsors Canada’s Olympic team, projected podium finishes in the sports of cycling, rowing, swimming and track and field.

The company, a premier partner of Own the Podium which provides technical support to national sport organisations with the aim of delivering more Olympic and Paralympic medals for Canada, made correct medal predictions in eight of 12 cases. 

Work previously done by their credit-risk and consumer-behaviour assessors is what the SAS will be looking to build on. 

"The work that’s going on is fine, but how do we really ramp up the horsepower?" COC chief executive Chris Overholt told The Canadian Press.

"The deal that we’ve done with SAS will layer into the work that the folks at Canadian Tire have already done.

"When you get started with an analytics company like SAS, one of the first things they ask you is, 'What kind of data points do you have that we can start to build from?'

"The great news here is the work that’s been done already will provide seminal data for the work we’re about to undertake with SAS."

Canadian Tire has also constructed projection models for the 2018 Winter Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, focusing on bobsleigh and skeleton, figure skating, freestyle skiing, luge and speed skating.