Transformational production: Inside TVN’s remote production push for the DFL’s Bundesliga 2

TVN has worked alongside the Deutsche Fußball Liga (DFL) and its host broadcast production company, Sportcast, for many years on Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2. This year it is taking some match productions for Bundesliga 2 remote for the first time

German outside broadcast company TVN boasts the Deutsche Fußball Liga’s (DFL) Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2 as one of its many clients, with DFL host broadcast production company Sportcast, for whom it produces almost three-quarters of all live matches annually. Also, the host broadcaster for DAZN’s production of the 2025 UEFA Champions League Final in Munich earlier this year, TVN positions itself as the premier technical services company in Germany.

On how the company has evolved to what it is today, Markus Osthaus, TVN’s CEO, tells SVG Europe: “In the past, we focused on growing our soccer business more and more to put us in a position here as a market leader. That was quite successful. Now we are doing almost 70% of all the matches in the Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2, we are doing all the European League matches and European Conference League matches for RTL, and we are also working with DAZN in the Champions League. ”

However, success comes with the price of being busy, which makes finding the time for new opportunities tricky, Osthaus says: “The downside of it was that there was hardly any capacity left to do other stuff. Only when there’s no football, we could do other things like big music festivals in Germany.

“To build up new capabilities, we brought two new OB vans to the market last year; number eight – Ü8 – is a really big one, and number seven is a smaller one, both for more capacity to do shows, to do other music events, and even do other sports. This is the focus for the near future: to keep our focus on soccer but not to have all our eggs only in one basket.”

He adds: “We have quite big trucks, which are, in my opinion, the right size for the large-scale productions we implement. We can handle [anything from] a Champions League Final to a festival like Wacken with these trucks.” Wacken Open Air is a heavy metal music festival held in the small German village of Wacken. It attracts around 85,000 visitors annually, compared to Glastonbury for comparison which attracts around 210,000.

TVN’s OB van crew working at the 2025 UEFA Champions League final held at the Allianz Arena in Munich, Germany, on 31 May

Premium remote

TVN has additionally looked at ways to innovate around the Bundesliga while focussing on football and increasing its capacity to be able to do more types of production. A key way it is doing that is with remote production. While that may not sound groundbreaking to some, in Germany remote production has up until now not been carried out for tier one productions. Therefore TVN has essentially created the country’s first premium remote production truck and facilities.

Osthaus explains: “We thought, “okay, how can we enhance and innovate the production of soccer?” Over the past years we had a lot of interchange with our main customer, Sportcast, the subsidiary of DFL. Not only to do OB vans, but to start the remote production business in Germany in a tier one spot like Bundesliga.

“We built a new venue van concept for remote production using one of our support trucks, which we refurbished. I think smaller productions will go more and more in the direction of remote production where easy connectivity is available. And in about five years’ time, it will be good to have big trucks for the big productions and to have remote trucks for smaller productions.”

As of this Bundesliga season, TVN is producing two Bundesliga 2 matches remotely every matchday. Says Osthaus: “Now remote production is really starting in Germany, and we were ready for this job in good time. We have just finalised our remote production area at our offices in Hanover with the core technology, and we have the director’s room located in Cologne where also the video assistant referee is located. We have started from September to do two matches per match day as a remote production.”

Transformational production

Remote production is the area Osthaus considers to be the most exciting and transformational for TVN right now and in the future. He says: “In England, remote production took off during COVID. Not in Germany. So, I’m really looking forward to establishing remote production in Germany and I am convinced we’ll do more and more remote productions over the coming years. I’m really happy that TVN is the one supplier who is starting it in soccer in Germany. I think this is a massive change in part of what we are doing, and how we are working together with the customer. And I think there’s a lot of joy in that issue.”

Premium tier productions as well as lower cost productions are still high in demand in Germany, and TVN’s move to be the first in the country to be able to carry out tier one level remote productions is a strong move, Osthaus says: “There will still be the premium productions where we really feel at home. We always said, “okay, we want to do the premium stuff [at TVN],” but I think the smaller productions will also rise.

“There will be a lot of productions that you can do remotely in the long run. Not straight away, because the connectivity costs are still quite high, at least in Germany, so you don’t save so much cost in remote production, you just have lower travelling costs. But I think the cost-effective issue will grow in the future,” concludes Osthaus.