InterDigital
Rajesh Pankaj, chief technology officer at
InterDigital, outlines how to overcome common pain points when streaming live sporting events Global sporting events have the potential to draw in armies of fans. These surges in traffic can often be unpredictable for broadcasters to navigate, risking delays, buffering or outages and undermining trust right when engagement is at its peak. It only takes one or two hiccups for fans to miss game-changing play. Technical issues remain a persistent friction point. As viewers part ways with traditional broadcast and cable, this is an important consideration for streaming platforms. InterDigital’s research found that over half (57%) of sports viewers face challenges when streaming sports. Meanwhile, 31% of sports viewers aged 18 to 24 cited poor video quality, insufficient bandwidth and lag as common problems. Sports fans should not have to deal with technical issues or subpar video quality. More efficient video codecs are one solution that streaming services must integrate if they want to keep delivering quality content. HEVC is well suited for high-resolution content like 4K, whereas H.266 Versatile Video Coding (VVC) offers even higher compression efficiency, improved video quality and extra support for ultra-high resolutions. While streaming services need to think holistically about the challenges that come with live video streams, more advanced video codecs can significantly reduce buffering and latency, improving the overall user experience.
“Technology-wise, it’s a gaming engine,” Murphy continues. “We’ve got Mo-Sys tracking systems on the cameras in the studio. All of that is in place already; it’s not something we’ve brought in specifically for this event. It’s all there. It’s ready to go.” With any virtual design, Murphy suggests, “you have to spend a fair bit of time on it and testing, rehearsals to make sure that what you’ve done visually works for the actual programme itself. There was a lot of back and forth on that, but everything went well on air.” By the numbers The BBC called in Sunset+Vine, an external production company, to help with its Euro 2025 coverage. “It’s the first time we’ve done the Euros in a while,” admits Stephen Booth, executive producer at Sunset+Vine – that’s 12 years, to be exact. “We’ve been part of the growth of women’s football. The contrast between 2013 and now is an astonishing difference,” he continues. The BBC used to broadcast its women’s football on BBC Two and Three; now, it’s on BBC One. “The crowds and audiences are in a different realm.” Sunset+Vine entered a tender process, competing for a contract with the BBC. “A load of different independent companies in the UK bid
for it,” says Booth. “The BBC liked our ideas and our approach to it.” Part of this approach was to work ‘as sustainably as possible’, according to Booth. “People travelled there and back by train. One of the challenges we faced was the time and the expense of that,” he admits. “Another challenge was the Swiss Working Time Directive, which places a restriction on the number of hours people work and the number of continuous days people work,” he explains. “It’s a very good idea in principle; it’s quite difficult to operate during a major football tournament.” Working under this directive meant outsourcing work to the team in Salford. “There’s no such thing as a Salford Working Time Directive,” Booth jokes. Remote production went smoothly for Sunset+Vine, as it was one of the first companies to do live remote broadcasts during Covid-19. “In comparison to that, it’s quite solid now. Once you get that genie out the bottle, it’s difficult to put it back in.” Besides broadcasting matches on BBC One, the BBC also shared its Women’s Euros content across its digital channels, including BBC iPlayer, the BBC Sport website and app, BBC Sounds and social media. “Twelve million people watched the final on the BBC,” Booth details. “That 12 million is the biggest UK TV
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