The story
History
Founding
The Arbiter assigning system was created in 1984 by Advanced Business Technology, at the request of the Utah High School Activities Association, who hired ABT to build a computerized method of assigning sports officials to matches and managing their assignments. Known as TheArbiter, the software was originally released on the MS-DOS platform, then for Microsoft Windows in 1997. Arbiter was released as a web application in 2003, known as TheArbiter.NET. Dave Yeast, former National Coordinator of Baseball Umpires for the NCAA, has served as the firm's vice president of officiating education.
2008: Acquisition by the NCAA
Arbiter was acquired by the NCAA in September 2008. The NCAA said their purpose in the acquisition, along with their acquisition of eOfficials LLC the same month, was to improve the quality and consistency of officiating at all levels of play.
2020 Family ID Acquisition
In February 2020, ArbiterSports acquired the online registration platform FamilyID, extending its product suite into student registration and program management for schools and community organizations.
2020 data breach
Arbiter experienced a data breach in 2020 and was charged with a class action lawsuit. The court did not favor any decisions and a settlement was reached upon by all the parties involved in 2021.
2021-Present
2025 Changes from ArbiterSports to Arbiter
The company rebranded from ArbiterSports to Arbiter, reflecting its broader mission to serve all aspects of K–12 operations and unifying its product suite under a single brand identity.
2025 NFHS Partnership Announcement
In June 2025, the National Federation of State High School Associations named Arbiter its “official and exclusive event, game and team scheduling partner” under a multi-year agreement.
Ownership and acquisitions
Arbiter is a privately held company headquartered in Sandy, Utah. It operates under Intermountain Sports Group and, in 2025, received a majority investment from the private equity firm Accel-KKR, which specializes in software and technology companies.
Since 2017, when it was acquired by Serent Capital from the NCAA, Arbiter has expanded through a series of strategic acquisitions in the education-technology sector
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Major acquisitions include:
FamilyID (2020) – online registration and activity-management platform for schools and district programs.
rSchoolToday (2025) – expanded the company’s scheduling, facilities-management, and website capabilities for K–12 schools and districts.
BigTeams (2025) – added school-athletics website and community-engagement tools to Arbiter’s product suite.
These acquisitions have been integrated into Arbiter’s platform to broaden its coverage across athletics, activities, and district operations within the K–12 sector.
Arbiter maintains partnerships with state athletic associations and school districts throughout the United States, providing technology to improve transparency, compliance, and administrative efficiency in extracurricular program management.
From Wikipedia’s article on ArbiterSports, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3