France Summit 2024: Cloud, IP, and AI drive sports production progress
Moderator and host Lise Cosimi on stage with Stephane Hourcq and Abhishek Ranade of Tata Comms Media
The rise of cloud and IP-based technologies and the new opportunities brought by the digital transformation were central in talks of the SVG France Summit, which took place in November at Espace Van Gogh Urban Station on the bank of Paris’ La Seine river. “IP is on its way!” panellists said.
The French-language event, sponsored by Tata Comms Media and moderated by Lise Cosimi, welcomed some 100 members of the French sports production community for an evening of discussions and networking on a range of pressing industry topics.
“More and more often we liberate from the physical infrastructures, doing more remote production, moving from satellite transmission to IP,” said during the evening’s introduction, Stephane Hourcq, sales director, sports, media, and entertainment, of Tata Comms Media.
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“I believe that the broadcast world is at an inflection right now, with players facing similar agenda when it comes to technology,” added Abhishek Ranade, MD of EMEA Media, Entertainment and Sport.
“They are facing three main challenges, one which involves producing higher quality content to keep the audience engaged; one of producing more content and more customised one while improving monetisation; and another to be efficient in doing all that; efficient in costs, and efficient in terms of environment,” he summed up.
Green matters
These concerns were echoed later on by France Télévisions, speaking about its first-time live coverage for 69 days of the torch relay during the Olympics, something that was made possible technically and financially thanks to the cloud and a combination of 5G and satellite internet transmissions.
Techlab director Romuald Rat explained the public service broadcaster is required to produce more content because competing with more diversified offers, and at the same time is submitted to budget restrictions and has committed itself to the Cop21 objectives, aiming to reduce its greenhouse effects by 42% by 2030.
Left to right: Moderator Lise Cosimi with France Télévisions’ Romuald Rat, Orange Sports & Media’s Nicolas Deal, AMP Visual TV’s Stephane Alessandri and EMG / Gravity Media’s Bruno Gallais
“A production like that ticks the three boxes,” he said. “Cost would have been 92% more if produced a traditional way,” he said. It required fewer human resources and no heavy infrastructures, no such things as OB trucks, for instance. “We avoided the equivalent of 610 tonnes of carbon emissions not produced.”
New opportunities
He agreed, however, it is not real savings because it would not have been done otherwise, as it would have been too expensive. “Where it is really positive is that it brings us a lot of new opportunities, to cover events of different sizes, including local ones, which is important for France Télévisions who runs regional and overseas channels networks,” he pointed.
Among the innovations which took place during the Olympics, was the use of the cloud on a large scale, as well as in some occasions of 5G transmission, and of mobile phones as live broadcast sources, including on the water.
AMP VisualTV was entrusted by OBS with, among others, Marseilles sailing races and succeeded in using mobile phones on boats, but joint MD Stephane Alessandri warned about finding a business model for private 5G on regular sports, stressing that the Olympics operates on large budgets and with much time ahead. “5G is not that easy,” he said.
IP infrastructure reaching maturity
The company was also in charge of using mobile phones during the Olympics ceremony to deliver closer shots of the 205 nations’ athletes, who, instead of a parade in a regular stadium, did that on boats on the Seine.
“After the Olympics opening ceremony, we can now say that this kind of IP infrastructure large scale has reached maturity,” said for his part Bruno Gallais, regional CEO, France & Italy of EMG/Gravity Media, a main OBS supplier, who deployed for its part 120 traditional cameras.
He said 74% of camera signals were transmitting via HF all along the Seine, which had been fibered by Orange, OBS sole telco partner during the Paris Olympics. “And all of that during four hours of pouring rain.”
AI spotting celebrities
Other panellists such as Lawo and TVU Networks confirmed that the cloud is now more and more used in large events. TVU Networks shared a use case about what was achieved for Red Bull Media House during the 2024 Wings for Life World Run, on which it provided the cloud ecosystem.
Beside distribution, the company also developed a new real-time content service using AI to produce instant clips featuring the race’s well-known faces.
Networking at SVG Europe’s France Summit 2024
“The Red Bull marathon, which has an audience of over 100m viewers, is so popular that celebrities around the world are participating without telling they do,” said Yves Tassel, business development director, Europe.
“The advantage with AI is that, as long as you train it, it can automatically detect well-known faces and athletes, or the numbers on runners’ jumpers.”
Because of the cloud ecosystem, all flows from various content creators arrive in the cloud waiting room, therefore available to all, and to the search engine.
Data online to be key
“Data online is going to be key as it will contribute to developing new usages,” estimated for his part, Patrick Jeant, CEO and founder of Yewth Studios.
He gave the example of The Wall Street Journal, who released during the Olympics an animation with cartoon characters using precise data from Leon Marchand’s performance. Yewth is producing content enhancement mixing data and augmented reality live powered with AI, and using game engine Unreal, optimised already for realtime.
Also combining data and AI is LiveU’s latest IP video transmission development, an upgrade of the company’s LRT technology, enabling, while filming in mobility, to detect automatically the best possible connection around, therefore guaranteeing extra reliability in quality and/or speed of images reception, and liberating from a fixed setup.
TVU Networks’ Jean-Christophe Albou and Yves Tassel
“The need for content is growing, something like that can contribute to covering smaller events we could not do before,” said Philippe Gaudion, regional sales manager.
“We try to bring solutions to a changing market.”
LiveU was also one of the Olympics services companies, having supplied a record 1,000 portable units to international camera operators.
- Thanks to all France Summit 2024 sponsors including Tata Comms Media, TVU Networks, Lawo, LiveU and Cobalt