LiveU Introduces Lightweight Sports Production Making Professional Sports Storytelling Accessible to All

Presents a catalyst for change in the sports production landscape with greater affordability, accessibility, inclusivity and sustainability

LiveU today launched its Lightweight Sports Production solution making fully featured, professional live sports production accessible and affordable for every event size. Lightweight Sports Production opens up new frontiers for diverse and minority sports that were previously sidelined due to economic, resource or time constraints. Built on a remote production “ground-to-cloud-to-crowd” model with broadcast-grade video performance, the turnkey solution offers a cost-effective alternative for any sports production, including mainstream sports broadcasts.

LiveU’s Lightweight Sports Production provides a complete capture-mix-share solution, making live video capture, program production and distribution collaborative and hassle-free. By eliminating the need for extensive production set-ups, on-site production trucks, or satellite uplinks, Lightweight Sports Productions can be taken to air for a technology cost of as little as $500 per event, giving producers total control over costs.

Seamlessly integrating LiveU’s portable 5G bonded video encoders with LiveU Studio, the company’s cloud-native video production service, the easy-to-use solution offers an affordable and quick route to get fully synchronized multi-cam sources into the cloud and out to digital and linear audiences.

Featuring the newly released next-generation version of LiveU Studio, hosting a range of sports-centric capabilities together with a brand-new intuitive interface, the solution is designed to be lightweight in terms of operation, but heavy hitting when it comes to fan engagement. This is all controlled from one screen, with the new Studio UX making a single operator possible, saving on resources as well as technology. The single operator can easily handle a complete production from a single pane of glass, including live switching, Instant Replay, ISO recording, SCTE-35 ad insertion, guest management and distribution. LiveU has also teamed up with selected third-party vendors to offer integrated HTML-based graphics and AI video editor tools for a more immersive audience experience. 

Steve Wind-Mozley, CMO, LiveU, said, “On this, LiveU’s 18th birthday, we wanted to honor the passion, dedication and enthusiasm of every player and storyteller involved in the world of sport. We are proud to introduce LiveU Lightweight Sports Production’s turnkey solutions that are designed to make producing high-quality, multi-angle live sports content simple, fast and cost-efficient and attainable for any event size. Fans of niche and developing sports, who were underserved can now be reached, offering fresh monetization possibilities for forward-thinking storytellers. Broadcasters, production teams, leagues, and content creators can easily ‘right-size’ their production costs, allowing them to produce far more content, more sustainably than before.”

LiveU’s Lightweight Sports Production includes third-party solutions to create a one-stop-shop for all sports production needs. Partners featured on LiveU’s IBC stand (7.C19) include:

• Tagboard – fully stocked with turnkey campaigns and graphics that elevate productions and revenue-driving opportunities, from fan feeds (social or direct uploads), polling, and trivia, to live stats automation, shoppable graphics, heatmaps, and QR codes. The cloud-based content production platform feeds an unlimited number of HTML5 outputs into the single LiveU Studio interface. Find out more here.
• SPX Graphics – provides HTML-based graphics software and related services. SPX Cloud gives live sports producers access to a rich and open graphics suite from within the LiveU Studio interface. Embedded as a dashboard, the SPX Graphics’ control interface allows users to preview and control graphics playout directly from a single screen user interface. Find out more here.
• Magnifi.ai – the AI powered video editor adds AI driven automated clippings and highlights to LiveU Studio, feeding live sports workflows via the single screen. The platform automatically generates clips and highlight sequences that can be fed directly into LiveU Studio to add color and context to live production. Find out more here or visit the Magnifi.ai stand at IBC (5.H52).

Matt Zajicek, LiveU’s Senior Director of Product Management, explained, “With the flexibility and scalability of our new solution, live sports content can be produced from virtually any location, whether it’s a grassroots event in a remote region or a specialized sport with a passionate fanbase, accelerating audience growth and value creation. Additionally, the cloud-based REMI or remote approach reduces the environmental impact of live production, supporting increasingly important sustainability goals by minimizing the need for on-site personnel and equipment. This inherent efficiency, combined with our leading video-over-bonded-IP technologies, means our customers can drastically reduce their per-event production costs, while increasing their high-quality, professional output.”

Find out more about LiveU’s Lightweight Sports Production and its IBC launch offers.

LiveU’s Lightweight Sports Production with its portable encoders and new LiveU Studio capabilities, features and integrations will be showcased on the LiveU Stand at IBC2024, Hall 7, Stand 7.C19 as part of the full LiveU EcoSystem IP-video workflow – from contribution and production to distribution.