UEFA’s Champions League Next Generation Services celebrated at the 2016 IBC Awards

UEFA’s Next Generation Services were recognised when they were nominated as a finalist from over 120 entrants across the Innovation Awards at the 2016 International Broadcasting Convention (IBC) Awards in Amsterdam earlier this month.

European football’s governing body finished runner-up in the category to BT Sports’ innovative Ultra High Definition (UHD) workflows, which included their cutting-edge UHD coverage of the UEFA Champions League and UEFA Europa League. Other winners on the night included NASA, the Society of Motion Picture & Television Engineers (SMPTE) and the director Mr Ang Lee. The IBC Awards celebrate the personalities and organisations best demonstrating creativity and collaboration within the broadcast industry, and showcased some of the most exciting and stimulating content from the year.

Bernard Ross, Head of UEFA TV Production, and Olivier Gaches, UEFA’s Digital Media Manager, collected the award on UEFA’s behalf.

Ross said: “UEFA are delighted to receive this award from IBC, and it represents another step in our long-term programme to ensure our broadcast partners continue to receive state-of-the-art UEFA content across all platforms – be that traditional television or digital platforms such as mobiles, tablets, smartphones and online.

“UEFA have brought together some of the best in the business – in deltatre, the EBU and EVS – and we have built a suite of products that deliver a complete digital and broadcast experience, from the stadiums to the watching fan at home each and every matchday. UEFA will continue to evaluate and develop our Next Generation Services; currently we are testing virtual-reality applications and producing 360°content for potential future inclusion.”

UEFA’s Next Generation services, launched ahead of the 2015/16 UEFA Champions League season and most recently deployed across UEFA EURO 2016, have enabled broadcasters to access and consume significantly more of the content produced on-venue by UEFA, and are delivered as both digital and broadcast solutions. The digital media services, built and coordinated by deltatre and incorporating EVS technology, have enhanced UEFA Champions League and UEFA EURO 2016 broadcasters’ video streaming, video clips, data, statistics and graphics assets and also include turnkey white-label digital apps. The EBU Box service has enabled subscribing broadcast partners to receive this UEFA Next Generation digital content in premium high-definition (HD) broadcast-quality direct to their premises anywhere in the world.

Further details of the 2016 IBC Awards, finalists and winners can be found at http://www.ibc.org/ibc-awards