LONDON—Vizrt has announced that it is providing automation technologies for live sports production to the Viaplay streaming service that are being used to cover Premier League action and soccer matches.

For this year’s soccer season, Viaplay’s goals were to simultaneously increase content output and improve show quality and consistency, while ensuring scalable workflows, the two companies explained. To accomplish those goals, it is using Viz Mosart on live productions, which allows a single operator to run an entire show, enabling the production of more localized content for different audiences.

Viz Mosart is designed to put all the power of the gallery and studio at the operator’s fingertips, with templated actions controlling lighting, graphics playout, robotic cameras, and videowalls simultaneously. Viaplay’s teams across Denmark and Norway are creating consistent, on-brand live content that entertains and informs soccer fans before, during, and after every Premier League match, Vizrt reported.

By automating repetitive tasks, Vizrt reported that users are able to ensure consistent, reliable productions, while enabling more creative storytelling and making it possible to deliver more content with the same resources. Viz Mosart is at the center of production workflows across the Viaplay studios, ready to be flexible and deliver what’s needed for each production team.

Viaplay subscribers across the Nordic countries and the Netherlands can tune in to the streaming service’s pre-match build-up, halftime debrief, and post-game analysis. For all live Premier League matches, soccer fans in each territory can enjoy commentary in their own language, providing them with unparalleled access to expert insight and coverage of the beautiful game.

“This is an important step in our journey to future-proof our sports productions, and without the reliable system and strong expertise we receive from Vizrt as our partner, it would not have been possible for this project to go live in such a short time,” says Robin Gerbino, vice president of production, sports operations at Viaplay Group.

“Production automation needs to be flexible to make a real difference. Adaptability is as important as reliability, especially in live sports, where so much of the excitement comes from not knowing what will happen,” says Andrew O’Neil, vice president of sports, strategy & growth at Vizrt. “The purpose is to free up your time, while keeping the production process efficient. With Viz Mosart, the show is completely yours to create and change as you please.”

To effectively implement Viz Mosart across the Viaplay studios, Vizrt offered comprehensive training of the automation solution for team leaders, including training in show design to help make shows as creative as possible.

Following the successful launch of the solution for Premier League content production, Viaplay plans on expanding its use to more markets and other sports coverage during the year — including premium rights such as the Champions League, Formula 1, Superliga, FIS Skiing, and many more, the companies explained.

"With our new partnership with Vizrt, centered around implementing Viz Mosart to strengthen our productions, we are very pleased with the collaboration and the support we have received making it possible to go live in the new soccer season kick-off. This is a first step, and we are very much looking forward to what the collaboration can bring in the years to come,” explained Gerbino at Viaplay Group.

To learn more about how automation streamlines production for news, sports, and other live and pre-recorded shows, please visit: https://www.vizrt.com/products/viz-mosart/

Premier Sports, an Irish-based premium sports broadcaster, has selected QuickLink’s Remote Commentary solution for introducing professional, high-quality remote commentators into live sports coverage. 

Premier Sports offers die-hard sports fans access to 24/7 on-demand video collection, with a host of live content, such as livestreams of some of the biggest sports events around the world, including Premier League, Formula 1, NBA, WTA, LaLiga, Serie A, Champions League, UFC, NASCAR and more.

Premier Sports has integrated QuickLink’s Remote Commentary solution to offer high-quality remote commentators, casters and announcers from any location worldwide into their live sports productions. The remote commentators can view real-time, high-quality video and audio of a sporting event while providing single or collaborative commentary from the comfort of their homes.

”The QuickLink Remote Commentary solution has been a revelation in enabling us to easily introduce remote commentators into our sports productions,” said Mark Pilkington, CTO at Premier Sports. “We are now able to easily introduce audio commentary from remote guests and more effectively provide audio commentary to our subscribers, “

The Remote Commentary solution facilitates multi-language remote commentary and seamlessly fits into any workflow. Available as software, hardware or cloud, the Remote Commentary solution uses QuickLink’s remote contribution solutions, high-level of remote guest control, broadcast-grade production tool or broadcast-grade hardware. This solution is being used to provide remote commentary for some of the world’s leading sports brands including Fox Sports, Red Bull Media House, ESL and Star Sports.

Mark added; “The high-level of remote control settings and dedicated commentary workflows within the QuickLink StudioManager ensure that we are able to easily incorporate remote commentators and castors into our sports commentary. The QuickLink solutions have enabled us to add a new dynamic to our sports production broadcasts, “

PHILADELPHIA—Comcast NBCUniversal has announced that the Premier League has joined the partner consortium of the Comcast NBCUniversal SportsTech Accelerator. 

As part of the partner consortium, the Premier League, which is the organizing body of the English Premier League football competition, will work with other members of the group as strategic advisors to the startups selected for the annual program, which is currently midway through its third cohort. 

In addition to advising the startups, the Premier League will have the opportunity to be involved in the selection of startups for SportsTech’s fourth cohort, which is currently open to applicants, as well as future classes.

“Through our first three cohorts, we noticed that more than one-third of startup teams applying are international and often looking to break into the U.S. market to further accelerate their business success,” said Jenna Kurath, vice president of startup partnerships, head of Comcast NBCU SportsTech. “The Premier League, with its expansive footprint, global fanbase, and incredible leadership will be a wonderful asset to our startups and their experience in the program. We’re excited to work alongside the Premier League team and startup founders to test and experiment with emerging technologies that will bring fans closer to the sports moments that matter.”

“We are delighted to be adding to our longstanding relationship with Comcast and NBC by joining the Comcast NBCUniversal SportsTech Accelerator,” added Paul Molnar, chief media officer at the Premier League. “We look forward to working with the Comcast NBCU team, Boomtown, and the other sports partners to help discover new and emerging technologies which can play a meaningful role in the ever-changing sports industry, while supporting the startup founders in their evolution and development.”

The decision to join the consortium builds on existing ties between Comcast NBCU and the league. 

Peacock and NBC Sports will serve as the exclusive U.S. media home of the Premier League Summer Series — the first ever Premier League-hosted pre-season tournament in the United States — featuring nine live matches across nine days beginning Sat., July 22.

All match and studio coverage of the Premier League Summer Series will stream live on Peacock in the U.S. 

Will McIntosh, president, Fandango & NBC Sports Next noted that in “assessing the next sports partner to bring on board, the Premier League was a standout choice that will provide value to the startups in the accelerator looking to find product market fit in the world of sports. With our broadcasting rights on Sky, Peacock, and NBC Sports, this partnership also creates a shared alignment for building new, more immersive fan experiences.”

Comcast NBCUniversal SportsTech was set up to spur innovation in sports technologies. 

As part of that effort it has built a distinct group of experts who advise the accelerator's participants.

These include business leaders from NBC Sports, Sky Sports, GOLF, NBC Sports Next, and Comcast Spectacor, alongside NASCAR, WWE, PGA TOUR and three U.S. Olympic sports organizations: U.S. Ski & Snowboard, USA Swimming, and USA Cycling. 

The Comcast NBCUniversal SportsTech focuses on providing opportunities for rising sports technology startups in the fields of media & entertainment; fan/player engagement; athlete/player performance; team & coach success; venue & event innovation; fantasy sports & betting; esports; and the business of sports.

Startups participating in Comcast NBCUniversal SportsTech also benefit from an ongoing relationship with the program and its partners. Since the first class in 2021, SportsTech startup alumni have participated in 103 pilots, partnerships, and commercial deals with consortium partners.

The startups selected for the fourth Comcast NBCUniversal SportsTech class will be announced in February 2024. Organizations interested in joining as part of the advisory group within SportsTech can visit https://www.comcastsportstech.com/partners. 

STAMFORD, CONN.—NBC was billing February as the “Best Feb Ever” in the weeks prior and that title held true for its NBC Sports Digital platform, as the network has announced that it set a record in unique users for the month of February on NBC Sports Digital with 93 million, according to multiplatform data released by comScore. The surge of unique users came as NBC Sports Digital provided coverage for the 2018 Winter Olympics, Super Bowl LII and Premier League coverage.

Yahoo Sports-NBC Sports Network’s 93 million unique users beat out second-place ESPN’s monthly unique users in February by 31 percent, as ESPN generated 71 million unique users during the month.

In NBC Sports Digital’s history, February was the second best month in terms of unique users, only trailing August 2016, when it generated 110 million unique users during its coverage for the 2016 Summer Olympics, NASCAR, the Premier League’s opening weekends and NFL preseason games. This year topped previous high marks in February, including February 2017 (51 million) and the Sochi-led Olympics in February 2014 (64 million).

[NBC Olympics Coverage Included 2.17 Billion Total Streaming Minutes]

Yahoo Sports-NBC Sports Network reportedly delivered 721 million minutes of streamed desktop video throughout February, good enough for the top spot among comScore’s Sports category. That represented a 387 percent increase over February 2017 (148 million minutes).

In addition, NBC-owned Golf Channel Digital was up 24 percent year-over-year for total minutes streamed (27.2 million) in February. All four PGA Tour events during the month recorded their highest live stream minute totals, per NBC. Consumption of Golf Channel Digital content across its website and mobile app were also up 13 percent for page views (87 million) and 5 percent for unique devices (4.2 million) from 2017.

STAMFORD, CONN.—There will be a new home for the 130 English Premier League soccer matches that NBC Sports does not air on broadcast or cable via a new streaming subscription service. The NBC Sports Gold Premier League Pass will be available for $49.99 and in addition to games will offer shoulder programming from NBC Sports and Premier League Productions.

For more information, read the full story on TVT’s sister publication B&C.