Virtual Reality is quickly becoming one of the hottest media platforms for fans to experience their favorite sports. From horse racing to football matches, VR is on the cusp of breaking out to the general public and NextVR is leading the charge as the only company capable of bringing live HD sports and entertainment experiences to the market. Already broadcasting globally, NextVR is capturing the world's most popular sports with the latest HD VR technology. NextVR Exec Chair BRAD ALLEN spoke with SBD Global about how he got involved in the industry and where NextVR is heading in the future.
On how he got involved with NextVR ...
Brad Allen: My background is in finance. I worked for major investment banks in New York, L.A., and Hong Kong. I built two technology startups during the late '90s, an e-commerce platform and an enterprise software solution. Two years ago this month (May '14) a friend of mine introduced me to one of the co-founders and said I had to check out what he was working on. I met in his garage and he showed me a clip from a (NBA) Warriors game they’d captured on the Oculus DK1. That was my holy ____/wow moment! I took the headset off and said, "I’d pay $20 to watch a game like that." I immediately reprioritized my life to come join NextVR as executive chairman.
On how NextVR's technology was developed ...
Allen: NextVR is built on a stereoscopic broadcast platform that was originally developed for capture and transmission of live-action stereoscopic 3D for 3D-TVs. Then known as Next3D, they worked with ESPN and Turner Sports when they broadcast games in 3D. Our co-founders DAVE COLE and DJ ROLLER developed our technology. Dave Cole has spent his career in digital imaging and stereoscopic 3D research and development. He was actually involved with the first wave of VR back in the '90s. He’s the author/co-author of our numerous patents around the capture and transmission of VR. DJ Roller is an award winning IMAX cinematographer who worked with JAMES CAMERON to build custom camera rigs for both 2D and 3D, and has produced many IMAX movies, some of which are still in theaters today.
On NextVR's business model ...
Allen: We’re still exploring different business models, but ultimately it's about selling the virtual ticket. There’s a finite inventory for available seats and geographic limitations to travel to any given event. VR allows us to offer infinite seats, which are often better than the best seat in the house. We plan to offer subscriptions to season packages and also single game/event tickets. Right now all of our content is available for free as we don’t want to create any barriers to entry as we try to seed the market and grow our audience. We also see potential revenue streams around sponsorships and advertising where there’s huge interest from advertisers to be associated with the cutting edge technology.
On NextVR's target market ...
Allen: Our strategy has been to engage the largest fan bases in the world. Those tend to populate around sports and music. If we can create compelling content for those brands with massive followings we think we can convert them into becoming NextVR fans as well.
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| Source: NextVR |
On NextVR's int'l presence ...
Allen: We’ve been thinking globally since day one and many of our events have been broadcast worldwide. In particular we have a large strategy around Asia, where there’s even greater interest in VR than here, and we are working on a number of partnerships there. We’ve already captured soccer in England and cricket in India and plan to do so on a regular basis. Globally, soccer is the most popular sport by a wide margin so we’re heavily focused on broadcasting matches from all the top leagues to fans around the world. We already have a partnership with the International Champions Cup to broadcast their matches this summer. International sports are where the biggest fan bases lie. IPL matches average over 200 million viewers, that’s more than the Super Bowl gets, and that’s for every match. In China there are over 300 million NBA fans, most of whom will never see a game in person. With VR we can change that. Aside from soccer, cricket and rugby, tennis, basketball and MMA are the other sports which have a tremendous appeal to global audiences and also happen to look great in VR.
On NextVR's partners ...
Allen: Fox Sports, who we have a 5-year agreement with, has been a tremendous partner. Together we’ve covered the US Open golf, Daytona 500, PBC Boxing, and The Big East Tournament, to name a few, with more events scheduled for later this year. We recently announced our new 5-year partnership with Live Nation to live-stream hundreds of concerts. Live Nation is the biggest promoter of live music in the world and we’re incredibly excited to be working with them on concerts and festivals. We also have a partnership with Time Inc. to produce content with their stable of brands, which include Sports Illustrated, Fortune, People, Entertainment Weekly, and others. We recently live-streamed the Kentucky Derby with NBC Sports. We produced content with HBO and Golden Boy Promotions for the Canelo Alvarez vs. Amir Khan fight.
On how NextVR's recent $30.5M funding round will be used ...
Allen: Help our company continue to grow. Much of it will be spent around growing our team and building out our technological infrastructure.
On the future of VR as a media platform ...
Allen: VR is a new medium. The way we see it, there was radio, then TV, and now VR. As traditional media becomes digital and live-streaming continues to grow, we see VR as sitting right at the nexus of all this, and as the natural evolution in the quest to get closer and become more immersed in the events we all love.
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