With a social media reach of more than 70 million and a growing live and PPV audience base, Fight Nation Championship (FNC) has established itself as a strong mixed martial arts organisation in Southeastern Europe. To build for the next phase of its growth, it has invested in a new OB vehicle to ramp up its production capabilities.
Established in 2019, the Fight Nation Championship is an organisation with a focus on showcasing the best local and emerging talent. Its events are hosted at arenas across the region including Arena Zagreb and Arena Pula, both in Croatia; Arena Stozice in Ljubljana, Slovenia; and the Beogradska Arena in Belgrade, Serbia.
Each event is broadcast via FNC’s dedicated pay-per-view (PPV) platform, FNC.tv, with coverage additionally distributed via SVoD platform Voyo, and replays of the events carried by RTL 2 TV in Croatia, both owned by prominent regional broadcaster CME.
The hybrid direct-to-consumer (D2C) and linear broadcast delivery format is something Martin Čehulić, CTO and head of production at FNC, believes will form the basis of sports viewership going forward. “I believe we’re heading toward a hybrid future,” he says. “Traditional TV still holds enormous influence, but digital streaming platforms are growing stronger every day. Rights holders will likely retain more ownership and control over their content as a result.”
It mirrors a wider shift towards D2C media distribution models being pursued by content providers outside of the traditional broadcaster set: sports rights holders, clubs, leagues, and independent production companies, to name a few. More ownership and control of a brand’s owned content has obvious benefits in audience engagement, and is something Čehulić is seeing more examples of with combat sports organisations.
“I believe more and more brands will shift toward their own online platforms, and this trend is already well underway. This applies across the board for most major fight promotions. The focus is clearly moving towards PPV and direct-to-consumer streaming.”
FNC focused on developing its own D2C offering early on, largely due to the absence of alternative options. “The idea to launch our own platform came from the lack of a stable and scalable PPV system in this part of Europe; something that could handle 100,000 to 200,000 concurrent users without crashing,” Čehulić explains.
“Given our prior experience with such systems, we were already familiar with the typical risks and challenges, allowing us to plan ahead and minimise potential failures. We also partnered with one of the world’s most powerful video hosting providers, giving us the infrastructure to even manage million-viewer streams inhouse.”
It also developed a partnership with leading regional broadcaster CME to ensure broader exposure across its SVoD and linear channels. “CME network recognised the strength of our brand and the explosive popularity of our sport. We’ve successfully brought it into the mainstream; today, we rank among the top two or three sports in the region in terms of arena attendance and content viewership, and our Instagram account alone generated over 110 million views in the past 30 days.
“CME saw the potential and we now collaborate through TV advertising and broadcast on their leading regional channels in Croatia and Slovenia. FNC.tv covers the rest of the world outside those territories.”
While the PPV model itself doesn’t directly impact FNC’s creative control, “we’ve always had full control over our content and production values,” says Čehulić, the organisation’s priority has always been “to deliver the best possible experience both for the live audience and for those watching the broadcast. That commitment is what brought us to where we are today.”
Strategic investment
Today, FNC honours that commitment by taking its production capabilities to the next level with an investment in a new OB vehicle powered by Blackmagic Design workflows. The upgrade is part of a long term strategy to continuously improve the production values of the events as they grow in popularity, and with an eye on potential expansion into regional growth markets.
“The new OB van is a major leap forward for FNC,” states Čehulić. “We built a full 4K system using the latest production systems from Blackmagic Design, integrated everything through a 10Gb network, and implemented the DaVinci Replay system using HyperDecks. The biggest advantage we’re seeing with Replay is the seamless cloud connectivity, which gives everyone on the team access to materials instantly.”
FNC’s production levels are consistent across all events, regardless of venue size. The most recent – FNC23, held at the Beogradska Arena in Belgrade, Serbia – featured more than 350 lights, 100 speakers, 250 square metres of LED screens, ten 4K cameras, main and sub control rooms and a crew of over 100 technicians working on the production. It marked the first outing for the new OB truck.
“There are always challenges; event production is one of the most stressful industries in the world, especially when combined with live TV broadcast,” Čehulić reflects. “For a first deployment with the OB unit, everything was pleasingly smooth and we were really satisfied with the results. The integration of Blackmagic Design systems just simplifies everything; from camera routing to replay, mixing, and post-production. Having a cohesive system minimises compatibility issues and operational delays.”
“The efficiencies we’re seeing in the post-production process, which is carried out entirely in DaVinci Resolve, has been significant,” he continues, “but the biggest benefit has been the time savings during set-up. What used to take two full days now takes just a few hours, which significantly streamlines our workflow.”
Continuous improvement
The operational benefits have given FNC the freedom to take more creative and commercial control over its event productions, as has been the case throughout its technical journey with BMD workflows.
“We started with Blackmagic’s Atem Television Studio HD (with 4 HDMI and 4 SDI inputs) at our second event [FNC 2, Zagreb, in 2019]. The biggest benefit of Blackmagic gear was that it allowed us to deliver high-quality broadcasts with relatively affordable equipment. If we had relied on hiring a full-scale production company from day one, we wouldn’t have been able to financially sustain the growth of our organisation.”
The investment in the new OB vehicle heralds the next phase of growth, as Čehulić and his team look to a horizon of opportunities for promotion.
“Our future plans include continuous investment in new equipment and systems to improve production quality with every event,” he concludes. “The new BMD systems and OB unit help us achieve those goals by giving us scalable and professional tools inhouse.”
Those ambitions and FNC’s success to date reflect the new democratised technology landscape where a new wave of high-end productions are being produced by content providers of all sizes. The shift to direct-to-consumer content distribution is empowering sports rights holders and organisations across the professional domain with greater control of their content. As Čehulić and the team at FNC is demonstrating, the hybrid pathway allows for greater engagement with its core audience at the D2C level, while broadcast distribution drives new eyes to its events.
The new OB vehicle is a purpose-built mobile control centre, allowing FNC to produce 4K broadcasts entirely inhouse. The team designed the system architecture around BMD’s Atem 4 M/E Constellation 4K switcher, connected via a 10Gb Ethernet backbone. Key hardware includes:
- Atem 2 M/E Advanced Panel 20 and Atem Camera Control Panel for multi-camera operation and shading
- URSA Broadcast G2 cameras with URSA Studio Viewfinders, Zoom/Focus Demand, and ENG Kits
- HyperDeck Studio 4K Pro for ISO recording and Blackmagic Replay for live and near-live highlights
- DeckLink 8K Pro G2, UltraStudio 4K Mini, and Blackmagic Videohub 40×40 12G for ingest, monitoring, and routing
- SmartScope Duo 4K and Cloud Store Mini 16TB for signal monitoring and collaborative post production
The truck’s signal backbone relies on 12G-SDI and optical fibre via BMD Mini Converters and Optical Modules, ensuring signal integrity over long distances, which is crucial for arena environments. The fully integrated nature of the system offers seamless interoperability and speed of deployment, as evidenced by Čehulić.
