The founding premise for YinzCam, a Pittsburgh-based mobile video startup, was simple enough, similar to many other startups. Priya Narasimhan, YinzCam’s Indian-born founder and chief executive, moved to the Steel City in 2001 and immediately fell hard for the city’s much-beloved Penguins and Steelers.
Pittsburgh Penguins fans have been able to use YinzCam
on their smartphones in the seating bowl or touchscreens
in the suites to watch video highlights and other content
during games. The Penguins are taking the technology
with them as they move from Mellon Arena into the new
Consol Energy Center this fall.
But Narasimhan never had lower-bowl or premium seats when she attended games at Heinz Field and Mellon Arena, and frequently grew frustrated by the lack of replays and other relevant information shown on the scoreboard and other video boards. Thus began a fervent pursuit to create a mobile-based solution providing many of the best elements of the in-home TV experience while attending games in person.
“I always had the nosebleeds and always had somebody blocking my view,” Narasimhan said. “I love, absolutely love, being there in person, being able to scream my head off and being with the other fans. But there was all that missing information, the replays, the other camera angles, a lot of the stats. So it was simply, ‘How do you get the best of both worlds?’”
YinzCam has worked with the Penguins the last two seasons on a free smartphone application providing alternate live camera angles, replays, other video-on-demand, real-time statistics and additional content, all working strictly in-venue using Wi-Fi networks. The YinzCam offering will move with the club this fall into the new Consol Energy Center, and has since expanded its client profile to the Jacksonville Jaguars, San Francisco 49ers and New England Patriots.
The company is far from alone in its quest, however, as heightening the in-venue fan experience with mobile content represents one of the fastest-growing elements of the wireless industry within sports. More primitive efforts such as text-to-scoreboard campaigns have been commonplace in sports for years. But the accelerating development of mobile technology and the growing need to engage more deeply with fans in-venue have created a fervent rush of activity in this space.
Miami Dolphins owner Stephen Ross late last year purchased Montreal-based mobile video outfit Kangaroo TV, has since renamed it FanVision, and will distribute about 20,000 wireless handheld units to Dolphins season-ticket holders that will play live video and audio, replays, highlights from other NFL games, statistics, personalized fantasy team tracking, and other content. The units are being provided free to the club’s season-ticket holders on a one-unit-for-every-two-seats basis, and then are due to be returned after the season.
Ross has offered FanVision units to the other 31 NFL clubs, and would like to see the device used in every Super Bowl, as it was in February at Super Bowl XLIV in Sun Life Stadium. The effort seeks to dramatically expand upon Kangaroo’s prior, more limited profile in golf and motorsports events that used a device rental model, and much smaller deployments last year with the Dolphins and several NFL teams before that.
Ross’ push is also fully in keeping with a broader initiative spearheaded by NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to improve and promote the in-stadium experience, as he, like many, is well aware of how football’s highly rated and increasingly immersive TV experience threatens the vitality of attending live games.
The Miami Dolphins use FanVision as a
component in a variety of business initiatives.
MLB Advanced Media is readying its own venue-based mobile application. Madison Square Garden earlier this year released, with wireless partner T-Mobile, an Android-based application that provides an array of content for fans attending New York Knicks games including behind-the-scenes video, wayfinding, concession information, social-media integration, merchandise discounts and other material, with content also accessible outside of MSG. And many other individual leagues, venue owners and cellular carriers also have developed, or are creating, similar offerings employing a mix of alternate video angles using additional in-house cameras, some repurposing of content distributed to networks, and real-time league stat feeds provided to teams, such as the NFL’s Game Statistics and Information System.
“It’s demanded of us as brands that we provide the highest level of fan interaction possible. Fans are simply expecting it now,” said Scott Richman, senior vice president and general manager for MSG Interactive. The owner of the Knicks and New York Rangers is working on a far more extensive version of the Knicks app that will also be available across all major wireless platforms and available for both teams.
“We do that interaction a lot of different ways, and have been doing that, it’s in our DNA,” Richman said. “But what’s beginning to happen now in this space really is enabling a whole new level of engagement. It’s very exciting. And since we came out with our app, we’re getting many calls from other teams, other venues.”
Making it work
There is little debate that pursuing more in-venue mobile offerings is in the best interests of fandom, and is fully in keeping with the extreme multitasking now common throughout society. But making that happen technologically, particularly to support data-hungry elements such as mobile video, remains a much more difficult proposition.
Most executives agree that existing cellular networks, already strapped amid surging demand, cannot properly handle the crush of 70,000 fans all in one spot, using their devices. And in many cases even an arena-sized crowd can easily prompt network congestion. So each of the sports-related in-venue mobile deployments look to get around that in some fashion.
YinzCam uses Wi-Fi networks, with additional routers stationed around each facility it works with to serve specific seating sections. Others similarly work using broader Wi-Fi networks that are constantly being enlarged. FanVision operates using a portion of UHF spectrum.
Madison Square Garden released an Android-
based application that provides content for
fans at New York Knicks games.
“So many of my conversations now are simply about, ‘Will this work?’ Narasimhan said. “And initially, the answer is usually no. So you walk around the bowl, and see how the signals are transmitting, and address the various areas. But that general conversation with teams is really about functionality and logistics now, not haggling over the concept itself. Teams have really already made that leap in most instances.”
Not entirely clear, however, is the issue of video rights. Generally speaking, initiatives such as YinzCam are permissible because they work strictly in-venue, are deliberately designed to not conflict with TV broadcasts, online streaming or other such entrenched activities, and are done in direct concert with the teams and building owners. But as these ventures attempt to incorporate more content, such as the NFL’s RedZone channel in many football stadiums, contractual language must be regularly scrubbed.
“A lot of things like that still need to be worked out with the league on this,” said Bill Prescott, Jaguars senior vice president of stadium operations and chief financial offer, of the clubs’ pending deployment of YinzCam. “We like to have RedZone as part of what we’re doing, but we’re still combing through all of that.”
Reaping the benefits
The accelerating push toward in-venue mobile products also stems from what executives see as far more than a simple initiative to help sell tickets. The Dolphins, for one, are linking FanVision in with their sponsorship sales; concession and merchandise sales as the team and company seek to develop touch-screen ordering capability on the devices; media strategies as team-controlled content such as pregame and postgame shows are strategically deployed across every medium, including FanVision; and the overall facility business at Sun Life Stadium as the devices are used to promote other events.
| Turnkey Sports Poll |
| The following are results of the Turnkey Sports Poll taken in June. The survey covered more than 1,100 senior-level sports industry executives spanning professional and college sports. |
 Does high-tech video within stadiums cause fans to feel that the in-venue experience is not that different from at-home viewing? |
| No | 74% |
| Yes | 21% |
| No response/Not sure | 5% |
| The in-game experience of which of the following leagues is most dependent on using video and displaying stats? |
| MLB | 49% |
| NFL | 21% |
| NBA | 14% |
| NHL | 6% |
| MLS | 2% |
| No response/Not sure | 8% |
| Do you think it was a good idea for the NFL to make the RedZone channel available for in-stadium use by NFL teams during their games? |
| Yes | 77% |
| No | 9% |
| No response/Not sure | 14% |
| Source: Turnkey Sports & Entertainment in conjunction with SportsBusiness Journal. Turnkey Intelligence specializes in research, measurement and lead generation for brands and properties. Visit www.turnkeyse.com. |
“The devices literally serve every single one of our business units,” said Jim Rushton, Dolphins senior vice president of corporate partnerships and integrated media. “That was really the a-ha moment once we found that it could be about much more than just an ad model. It can’t just be about that. Instead, it’s driving every one of the verticals in our business. It was originally presented to us as just an ad unit thing, but we’re definitely looking at this much more holistically.”
Within that mind-set, the FanVision units will contain a mix of content that users can access at will, and certain overrides that are programmed by the team. For example, the club is seeking to sell a broad “touchdown” sponsorship in which a corporate logo would simultaneously appear on the FanVision units, the stadium scoreboards, and Dolphins.com following a score by the Dolphins.
Overall, the FanVision units could spur at least a low eight-figure bump in overall incremental annual revenue through the various business units, Rushton said, with little if any ceiling in future growth potential.
“As this becomes more ubiquitous and bandwidth improves, there’s really no limit to what we can do,” Rushton said.
The Jaguars opted to work with YinzCam, believing that its fans would not want to carry and use another device beyond their own cell phones. But similarly, the club is making the in-venue content available initially to about 11,000 club-seat holders, and is using YinzCam as a value-added service well beyond just video, also providing facility wayfinding, social-media integration and other material.
“A lot of this is still experimentation right now, but it’s very clear that the smartphone is a very powerful tool for the game-day experience,” Prescott said. “In another two years, it could all be very different, and in fact, we expect it to be, but this is going to be a very good learning experience. As more teams also experiment, we expect to have a much better understanding on how best to put together a game plan in this area.”
