ATEME, Zixi Provide Tech to Stream Live Ultimate Fighting Championship Events

Through its partnership with Zixi, ATEME, has delivered the technology necessary to stream high-quality video over the Internet for Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) events.
The UFC’s plan to produce approximately 50 six-hour live fight events across the world, results in production challenges: Many locations and venues have limited IP connectivity, making it difficult to deliver an efficient means of video distribution.

“We had significant challenges in delivering multiple formats of video with limited connectivity and unpredictable bandwidth,” says Christy King, VP, Technology R&D at Zuffa, LLC. “The Zixi/ATEME solution is an innovative approach that provides reliable video feeds for our staff, media partners and worldwide fans. The solution is a low-cost, high-quality video experience.”

The UFC selects best-of-breed contribution solution: UFC looked to technology partners, ATEME and Zixi, to provide a solution that utilizes Internet connectivity for the distribution of video content and new ways to support multiple production workflows over IP.

Successful proof-of-concept results in reliable connectivity: Based on the success of the initial proof-of-concept, a small rack now travels around the globe, to every fight, to supplement global satellite feeds with video-over-IP delivery.

Supports multiple production “cloud-based” workflows: This groundbreaking technology produces high-quality compression that allows the UFC to use any feed from its production truck and create distinct workflows to distribute video around the world. Additionally, the software has provided the UFC with the tools to develop a series of “cloud-based” workflows that include the live capture of events, statistics logging and live streaming.

Las Vegas UFC event demonstrates highly innovative application: The first successful trial of the technology took place in Las Vegas during the George St. Pierre/Hendricks fight on November 16, 2013 and is now in continuous use for all events.

“The integration of our streaming technology into ATEME’s Kyrion encoders and decoders delivers an enhanced quality of service over the Open Internet,” says Eric Bolten, VP strategic account development at Zixi, LLC. “The power of combining our streaming technology with ATEME’s world-class video quality is demonstrated in the successful launch by Zuffa/UFC.”