The European and Australian broadcast rights holders for the U.S. Open are using BT Broadcast Services' all-digital transmission infrastructure to send the tennis tournament abroad.
Rights holders Eurosport and Network 9 Australia have engaged BT's global setup, which includes the integration and coordination of a turnkey system with a hybrid of satellite and fiber capabilities. From The Arthur Ashe Stadium in Flushing Meadows, N.Y., signals are being transmitted to multiple destinations in Europe using a Ku-band "Special Events Mux," uplinking five simultaneous channels of 36 MHz to the new NSS 7 satellite. The same flyaway is also transmitting a Single Channel Per Carrier signal to NSS 7 for unilateral contribution feeds for stand-up shots and various ad hoc feeds.
BT's C-band flyaway uplinks 18 MHz of capacity to AMC4 being used as a domestic backhaul path to BT's Media Center in Los Angeles and uplinked to Network 9's full-time service, also provided by BT, on IS 180 for a downlink in Australia. A 270-Mb local fiber loop from the venue to BT's New York switch are being used as a fiber backup to the satellite feed to Australia.
