Eluvio and the United Rugby Championship (URC) have announced first-year results for URC TV.
URC is a diverse competition reaching a global audience through its premier streaming platform, URC TV, powered by Eluvio.
Using the Eluvio Content Fabric and Application Suite, URC has successfully transitioned from a high-overhead legacy architecture to next-gen video distribution and monetisation that has drastically improved the bottom line while enhancing the fan experience across the globe.
Prior to partnering with Eluvio, URC TV relied on legacy streaming providers, where operational costs were outpacing ROI, hampering product innovation and growth. Under the prior four-year arrangement, running costs for URC TV made for marginal profitability.
“In the old world, we were running at extremely high streaming costs and expending a lot of effort for relatively little reward,” said Adam Redmond, media director at United Rugby Championship. “We knew we wanted to deliver an exceptional fan experience and transformational cost-efficiency. Eluvio already had a proven track record with our partners EPCR TV, and we believed their innovations could deliver, on both the cost and quality side of the equation, to better serve our fan base worldwide.”
Through an accelerated migration of URC TV to Eluvio’s platform, URC was able to retain its installed base, launch a new subscription service with full continuity for legacy fans, and achieve a record-level of new subscriptions and profitability. With Eluvio, URC TV delivered upgraded picture quality and viewing experiences, accelerated growth, improved marketing efficiency and fan engagement, and increased profitability while also lowering prices.
Redmond continued: “For rights holders without unlimited resources, this is the lesson: the right tech partner is not just a streaming decision, it is a business model decision. Autonomy, cost control, and platform reach are what unlock commercial growth, which is exactly what Eluvio provided to URC TV. Most importantly, Eluvio innovations are all focused on enabling us to drive fan usage and engagement.”
Specifically, in its first year using the Content Fabric, URC TV has experienced a 62% reduction in costs through a more efficient content delivery model; a 64% increase in transactions, demonstrating higher fan engagement and a more effective commercial funnel; and a revenue increase of 35%, while simultaneously lowering prices, in all markets to win over more fans. In addition, subscribers have grown 2.7X with viewers in 150 countries, over 1.25 million sessions, and an average season watch time of 20 hours per viewer.
“We’re honoured to play such a key role in the commercial success of URC TV, and believe URC TV is a model for sports leagues and content owners of all sizes around the globe,” said Michelle Munson, CEO and co-founder of Eluvio. “We’re proving that the Content Fabric can shatter the cost and efficiency boundaries that have held back video over IP for decades, maximise monetisation, and expand global distribution and fan engagement. The Eluvio approach significantly simplifies the tech stack while providing maximum efficiency and innovation. Teams, leagues and brands can lessen their operational burden while also delivering an exceptional fan experience and profitability.”
URC TV, powered exclusively by the Content Fabric and Application Suite, now serves as a global streaming hub, delivering over 180 live games, instant live-to-VOD, DVR, and highlights to rugby fans in over 150 countries. All content is derived from the live stream with zero copies, thanks to the breakthrough Fabric protocol. Viewers can watch matches on their connected devices and TVs via Eluvio’s Media Wallet native apps for Android TV, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung, LG, and Roku for a premium lean-back viewing experience. URC TV’s user experience on browsers, mobile devices, and TVs are all managed using Eluvio Creator Studio CMS.
For matches, Eluvio receives live source feeds directly from the contribution provider and dynamically ingests, transcodes, publishes and generates just-in-time streaming output directly to fans worldwide including multiple audio channels, and inline strong DRM (Widevine, Fairplay, PlayReady, etc.). Low-latency high-frame rate streaming is provided direct-to-consumers by the Content Fabric with an average serving latency of under 200 milliseconds globally and average playback latencies of 5 seconds at full source resolution with dynamic automatic adaptation to the user’s available bandwidth, with unlimited multi-view and “zero-copy” live-to-VoD. Broadcast rights windows are enforced dynamically via Eluvio authorization policies and in-Fabric entitlements.
Additionally, Eluvio Video Intelligence Editor (EVIE) is used to adjust VOD head and tail clipping and directly publish to URC TV instantly, without file copies or re-transcoding.
Recently, Eluvio introduced automatic transcription of multi-audio commentary, AI-generated chapters, and in-line play-by-play descriptions through the Eluvio AI stack. After matches, partners can generate streams and search and download clips from the EVIE interface, also without file copies.
Fans purchase season subscriptions and monthly passes, minted upon purchase by Eluvio, and the entire experience is designed for high throughput purchases across the globe. Fans also benefit from a fully integrated single sign-on using their URC IDs, through the Eluvio Media Wallet, for a seamless experience across browsers and TVs. All sessions are identified with the Media Wallet address and URC ID for audience and transaction analytics and customer engagement. Eluvio Content Analytics also provides URC with complete transparency of source-to-viewer audience, QoS, and sales purchase analytics without third-party applications or intermediaries.
