Supponor surpasses expectations with a season of exceptional growth
Supponor has exceeded its targets to double the deployment of its AI-based virtual advertising platform Supponor Air, growing beyond the 1,000+ events delivered in the 2021/22 season. The technology was implemented in close to 3,000 live sports events across every continent, encompassing a wide variety of sports from football to hockey to motorsport during the 2022/23 season. The company also continued to grow in line with these achievements, announcing several senior executive appointments and the opening of a major new R&D facility focusing on AI.
A number of new deals with sporting federations and organisations were brought to fruition this season, including the NHL, which partnered with Supponor in a multi-year agreement to develop its Digitally Enhanced Dasherboard (DED) technology solution, enabling the real-time digital replacement of camera-visible arena dasherboards within live local, national and international NHL game broadcasts.
The technology was deployed this season across all 32 clubs and arenas, supporting over 2,500 distinct live broadcast integrations across more than 1,400 games, enabling market-specific, targeted advertising and promotional messaging for the first time. This is a major step in Supponor’s growth in the ice hockey world, building up from its ongoing partnerships with 3ICE and IIHF.
The adoption of Supponor Air in football also continued to gain momentum, with leading federations including the FA (UK), RFEF (Spain), DFB (Germany), FIGC (Italy), ÖFB (Austria) and SvFF (Sweden) all deploying the virtual advertising technology during key international match broadcasts. Supponor’s technology has also been adopted by several elite football leagues and clubs, including the Bundesliga (Germany), La Liga (Spain), Serie A (Italy), Ligue 1 (France) and the A-Leagues (Australia) as well as on a pan-European level.
In the past year, Supponor has expanded its dominance of virtual advertising in several new sports, including basketball, cricket, rugby, motorsports, baseball and handball. The European Handball Federation (EHF) worked with Supponor to implement virtual advertising at the Women’s EHF Euro 2022 tournament in Slovenia, marking the first ever virtual advertising deployment in handball and the first use of Supponor technology at a women’s sports event.
James B Gambrell, CEO, Supponor, said: “It has been an incredible year for Supponor as we exceeded our goals for live event deployment, cemented existing partnerships and built relationships with new customers, and continued to develop our AI-based technologies as we seek new marketing opportunities for rights holders in sports. Far from resting on our laurels, we are galvanised to move towards the new season with renewed ambition to surpass this year’s outstanding achievements.”