Sky Germany produces the Bundesliga handball final with Vizrt in a cloud and 5G environment

The Liqui Moly Handball Bundesliga final was produced in the cloud by Sky Germany with the Vizrt switching, graphics and sports analytics tools, all deployed on AWS over the O2 5G network.

Sky Germany used the live production solution from Vizrt, comprising Viz Vectar Plus for switching, Viz Libero for sports analytics and Viz Engine et Arc de visualisation for graphics, all via the cloud. The Vizrt tools were facilitated by EST, specifically the NDI Bridge feature, which moved the program feed from the cloud to the Sky Munich headquarters.

Le Sky Germany production setup also included a live mix of signals from broadcast cameras and cell phones. A 5G transmission powered by LiveU technology with “near-zero” latency was used for this work. This is not the first production of its kind, as Sky, O2 and Vizrt powered a similar experience in 2020. In addition to the classic TV broadcast, the match was streamed free of charge for fans on skysport.de and on Sky Sport’s YouTube channel in Germany.

This is how URL de Daniel, global head of product management at Vizrt, assesses the initiative: “For the first time ever, someone is doing an end-to-end 5G live production leveraging the brand new NDI Bridge and our cutting edge graphics, analysis and production tools – all in the cloud. We are extremely proud to work with Sky on this boundary-pushing production.”