Ericsson and U.S. Ski Team bring the 2015 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships to the USA

This year's championships take place in Falun, Sweden, from February 18 to March 1. Ericsson will use its existing solution on top of its Service Enablement Platform plus Mediaroom Reach TV Anywhere solutions to make live broadcast feeds from the event in Falun accessible via the Live Arena Falun2015 app, developed by Tension Graphics.

As the digital experience partner to the 2015 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships in Falun, Ericsson has delivered a platform called Ericsson Networked Event that collects a vast amount of data and information from and around the championships. The information is made available to developers through APIs that make it possible for third-party developers to create apps and interactive webpages that offer a unique second screen experience for ski fans and followers of the championships.

Together with the U.S. Ski Team, the broadcasting rights owner in the U.S., Ericsson can now offer this experience to the North American market. Through two different apps, fans and followers of the championships will get detailed information and a better experience of all competitions.

Michael Jaquet, Chief Marketing Officer at the U.S. Ski Team, says: "The U.S. Ski Team invested in the U.S. rights to the World Championships in order to ensure that our fans in America would have the opportunity to watch the action live. With its innovative Live Arena app, Ericsson is an outstanding partner to help deliver the event to the USA."

Cecilia Atterwall, Head of Strategy, Marketing and Communications at Global Services, Ericsson, says: "We envisage a Networked Society in which connectivity is the starting point for new ways of innovating, collaborating and socializing. As the digital experience partner for the 2015 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships, we're excited about the opportunity to demonstrate - together with the U.S. Ski Team - a very practical example of the Networked Society in action.”

While viewers in Sweden will also have the option of watching the 2015 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships on broadcast TV, the Live Arena Falun2015 app will be the only means of watching live TV coverage of the event in the U.S. Viewers in the U.S. will also be able to catch up with events they miss by watching video on demand on the U.S. Ski Team website: www.usskiteam.com/nordic. A link available in the Live Arena Falun2015 app will make it easy to switch between the app and the U.S. Ski Team website.

Atterwall adds: "Perhaps the most interesting aspect of how the FIS Nordic World Ski Championships will be viewed in the United States is the fact that what we normally call the 'second screen' ï¿1Ž2- mobile phones, tablets and computer screens - will in fact be the primary screen. This supports one of the 10 hot consumer trends that Ericsson announced at the end of last year, and we predict that 2015 will be the first year in which more people watch streamed content than watch broadcast TV."

Beyond the broadcast experience, the Live Arena Falun2015 app also offers a highly immersive, interactive experience that will allow users to follow their favorite skiers as they compete and take a virtual tour of the ski stadium. In the United States, the app also incorporates all TV streams - meaning the user can choose from a variety of different camera angles to create a personalized viewing experience. 

At the event, around 700 athletes from more than 50 countries will compete in cross-country skiing, ski jumping and Nordic combined events.

Together with Ericsson, Agama Engages in the World Ski Championships 2015

Agama Technologies, the video service quality assurance expert, today announces that it has been selected by Ericsson to monitor and assure the next-gen, interactive viewing experience that it is creating for the 2015 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships, taking place in Falun, Sweden, from February 18 to March 1.

As the digital experience partner for the Falun2015 event, Ericsson is providing the Ericsson Networked Event, a solution to enable an enhanced and 'beyond skiing' experience to mobile device users all over the world. For this 12-day championships, the Ericsson Networked Event combines both live TV, VoD and competition data into a downloadable application for iOS, Android and Windows PC. Ericsson has turned to Agama for effective monitoring and quality assurance of the streaming video within this platform.

Cecilia Atterwall, Head of Strategy, Marketing and Communications at Global Services at Ericsson, says: "Via the apps and the website, spectators will be able to access real-time information about competitors, statistics, the history of the event, schedules, transport to the venue, parking, places of interest and much more. The apps will also be useful for volunteers, media representatives and other target groups that require information or need to communicate during the World Championships. Never before has the FIS World Ski Championships been as easily accessible. We have combined many great product lines in Ericsson to create the Ericsson Networked Event platform and we're pleased to have Agama onboard as a valuable partner for the critical service assurance aspects."

Mikael Dahlgren, CEO at Agama, adds: "This virtual interactive arena is a true advancement of the viewing experience. We're proud to be a part of the next-gen event-based service enablement platform that Ericsson is debuting at Falun2015. We are a vendor in the technical forefront and these kinds of innovative TV services are an emerging and exciting segment for us to explore going forward."

Agama has the industry's most comprehensive offering for assuring OTT and multiscreen video deployments end-to-end, providing full transparency of the service distribution from the head-end to the viewing device. The Agama DTV Monitoring Solution enables insights that support video service providers in ensuring optimal service quality, reaching higher operational efficiency and getting better customer understanding - ultimately to secure a rapid and cost-effective service growth.