The transition to IP delivery and production will continue to have major impact on every aspect of the industry. Whether on-prem or from data centers, this transition is revolutionary. Software-only implementations, together with subscription-based microservices, will be the next wave impacting opex vs capex and how business gets done. Bridge Technologies and their representative in North America, 2110 Solutions, are at the center of this transition. Their solutions for monitoring, analyzing, and visualizing every aspect of the live production and distribution signal chain are comprehensive. SMPTE 2110 and 2022-6 standards for live-production applications offer incredible flexibility and big cost savings for those that can use it in collaborative environments in studio, cloud, image, or REMI applications.

A key technology trend reshaping business strategy is the shift to hybrid working, driven by the rise of remote working post pandemic. Employees now expect the same seamless workstation experience at home as in the office, prioritizing easy access to their tools and data. Supporting this shift involves remote management, virtualization, and AI to enhance user experiences and optimize infrastructure. These technologies, alongside advances like higher bandwidth and latency reduction, are critical to meeting evolving demands for flexible, effective work environments over the next three to five years.

Currently, it’s software-defined infrastructure and the rapid pace of development. Over the history of broadcast production, the lack of compute power made software-defined workflows at high production values impossible: only with dedicated hardware could we provide sophisticated audio and video processing. Now general-purpose computing — especially with the addition of GPU-based computing — removes the need for dedicated, specialized processing hardware. Because of the increased speed of general-purpose computing, we don’t need a dedicated FPGA or processor to build fast video switchers and mixing consoles. Plus, the rate at which hyperscalers like AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud are making upgrades to their technology and services is dizzying. Nvidia Holoscan for Media is a software-defined platform built on industry standards and APIs.

As an energy-solutions company, we’re naturally adapting our products to meet the demands of the energy transition. Many of our customers are interested in low-emissions solutions that still provide reliable, off-grid power. In response, we’ve created our most efficient generators yet, Tier 4 Final units that meet the EPA’s most stringent requirements. We’ve successfully deployed these at various events, including this year’s Miami Grand Prix and Las Vegas Grand Prix. We have also integrated our energy-storage solutions into our offerings for event power, providing an even more sustainable and environmentally friendly alternative for temporary energy needs. In the years to come, we expect our battery storage units to become a more critical part of our power solutions for events like Formula 1 races.

We see the growth of natural-language understanding in AI as transformative for the way services like subtitling, voice translation, and even content production will change. In the past year, we’ve seen AI surpass humans in most typical cases for same-language live transcription. In the next three to five years, this is probably also going to happen in more heavily human-edited prerecorded-type captioning/subtitles, as well as in language translation both in text and with synthetic voice. These services are going to become a lot more common as they become less expensive and less difficult to organize into automated workflows.

Convergence is key. Moving away from islands of technology that have to be independently managed to environments with a high degree of interconnectedness is making deployments, workflows, and maintenance more efficient. Convergence is allowing greater automation of a wider range of systems at a higher degree of intricacy. An excellent example is the ability to have video and audio production and playback systems communicating on the same shared network as data collection (statistics), timing systems, and even lighting systems, allowing all of them to work together with minimum operator participation. A TD can press one button that triggers a complex set of switcher actions with graphics enhancements on multiple LED surfaces, playback elements, audio components, and even light shows to engage crowds.

AI is revolutionizing the video industry. AnyClip has leveraged AI since its inception, but the rapid adoption of GenAI, spurred by ChatGPT, accelerated innovation across our platform. At AnyClip’s core is proprietary AI that analyzes every video frame by frame. We tag actions, teams, objects, content categories, people, sentiment, and brand safety flags. We’ve taken this further for the sports industry with our new Wildcard Model, built to identify and enrich sports-specific moments: such as scoring plays and game highlights. This transforms video assets into interactive, searchable content, unlocking new ways to engage fans and monetize. AI will continue redefining video. AnyClip will continue to innovate to create smarter, personalized experiences for viewers.

A key trend shaping the future of sports broadcasting is the increasing evolution of personalization to enhance the viewer experience. Viewer-selected camera angles, combined with real-time data insights, are transforming how fans engage with sports. Innovations including AI-driven analytics and customizable data overlays provide deeper context and more control over the viewing experience, making it more immersive. Although the handling of multiple camera angles is already highly achievable and being delivered by Appear, the industry still faces some challenges in holistic and standardized techniques for end-to-end metadata transport. Over the next three to five years, user-controlled viewing and immersive technologies will further personalize sports broadcasts, allowing fans to choose camera angles or follow specific players in real time, creating a more engaging and interactive experience.

Transformation of IP-based infrastructures in sports broadcasting continued in 2024 and will do so into the future. At the center is a growing reliance on software-defined processing, virtualized environments, and commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) technologies, shifting from hardware-heavy setups to flexible, software-centric systems. In Paris in 2024, OBS (Olympic Broadcasting Services), in partnership with NEP Group and Intel, deployed a fully virtualized production solution, demonstrating COTS potential in Tier 1 broadcast. Virtual OB is a software-driven, virtualized solution at the highest level. Instead of trucks or flypacks, OBS chose COTS servers. arkona and manifold were part of NEP’s Virtual OB. manifold CLOUD provided the multiviewer and signal-processing solution for the platform, which runs on COTS FPGA acceleration cards from multiple manufacturers (including arkona) within a private-cloud environment.

The key trend impacting everyone in the AV industry is the ongoing shift of technology implemented for productions toward the use of flexible software that can be deployed both on-premises and in the cloud. Although specific hardware technologies have their place, the large up-front capital costs make technology refreshes expensive and unwieldy. That can keep the best technology available out of the hands of teams who would benefit most from it. By implementing innovations into software that isn’t bound to specific hardware, teams can take advantage of production flexibility offered by software and deploy solutions where they make most sense.

Audio-over-IP continues to be a technology trend that is positively impacting our business. More than 10 years ago, we developed one of the first direct-to-IP microphones in the commercial-audio market. We are now seeing broadcast workflows benefit from direct-to-IP mics and believe that, in the next three to five years, the broadcast-audio workflow will support a full complement of IP mics, eliminating most analog-mic connections. Adoption of this technology for broadcast will be more than just moving audio over a category cable and click routing, it will empower the audio team to set up, control, and monitor the real-time status of the mics remotely. Audio-Technica’s strategy is to refine and improve the digital portion of the IP microphone for broadcast applications.

The increased demand for cloud-based workflows has significantly impacted Avid’s strategy. Media professionals seek scalable, flexible solutions that allow creators to collaborate seamlessly from anywhere. We are focused on enabling this shift by empowering geo-dispersed teams to easily and cost-effectively create and deliver content faster and more efficiently. Although already a major component of our solutions, looking ahead in three to five years, we can all expect AI and machine learning to play an even greater role in revolutionizing media production. From automating routine tasks like metadata tagging to enhancing creative decision-making with intelligent editing and recommendation tools, these advances allow creators to focus on storytelling by achieving unprecedented efficiency in the necessary tasks that slow them down.

Globalization — making content relevant to new markets — is a priority for leagues as evidenced by the increased export of games and players beyond traditional borders. Reliable, scalable, flexible infrastructure and capabilities are going to be integral to supporting this continued trend. Whether it is using analytics to educate new fans, producing cloud-based alternate broadcasts (Big City Greens + NHL, Simpsons + NFL, etc.) to attract families and young fans, or providing translation services and generative-AI commentary to be locally relevant, engaging new and diverse fanbases is critical to the continued growth of sports organizations.

Today, a key technology trend is the move to cloud, whether private or public. Currently, we mainly see people using virtualization in the context of a private cloud to reduce hardware-specific dependencies and increase scalability. This supports REMI and other trends. In three to five years, AI/machine learning is seen as a key technology. We are in early days of AI and ML, but they will drive significant change in sports broadcasting. Object recognition and automation for outside broadcasting or production-control rooms will be leveraged to increase the span of control for operators. The next three to five years will be an exciting period of technology augmentation for operators and editors.

SMPTE ST 2110 is gaining traction in the industry by enabling more-flexible and -efficient workflows. Blackmagic 2110 IP converters facilitate the transition from traditional SDI to IP networks, allowing easier scalability and integration. ST 2110 and the Blackmagic IP10 codec also help minimize latency, enhancing real-time production capabilities. Traditionally, a hurdle for implementing ST 2110 has been the need for an IT department to keep video systems running, but Blackmagic 2110 IP converters connect point-to-point, so you don't need a complex Ethernet switch and can reap the advantages of ST 2110 IP video using simple Ethernet cables, remote power, and bidirectional video.

The growth of cloud production has significantly impacted our business with its quality, redundancy, access to top talent, reduced carbon footprint, and ability to produce Tier 1 events. As a result, we’ve focused our investments on expanding our private cloud infrastructure and refining how we design and build REMI mobile units to support Tier 1 events.

Virtualization technologies are a key element of Calrec’s current and future development strategy. The shift to IP infrastructure is enabling greater diversity in how broadcasters can leverage the benefits of distributed production. The ability to place resources where they can be used most efficiently and to control these facilities from different locations is a key tool for broadcasters looking to maximize efficiency. At Calrec, we are working with a range of virtualization technologies from remote surface to audio-processing–engine control links (Calrec’s True Control 2.0) and fully virtualized web-served audio-console control applications (Calrec Assist) and providing audio-mixing processing within public-cloud environments (Calrec’s ImPulseV). The combination of these technologies provides a powerful tool set to maximize efficiencies within broadcast-production workflows.

We have been seeing a slow adoption of ST 2110; most believe it is not quite here yet. Canare has been on the forefront of the tried-and-true 12G-SDI standard with our coax, connector, and video-patch-bay line of products. We have also started introducing ST 2110 products, such as our Keystone panels and connectors, CAT6A Ethernet cable, field terminatable RJ45, SFP modules, and fiber products.

The virtualization and optimization of software solutions as cloud-native tools has had a major impact on our business. With vendors delivering solutions designed for cloud environments, we can more quickly implement those technologies within our Livelink IP video-orchestration, automation, and provisioning platform to achieve on-prem performance along with elastic, efficient resource usage. Resources can be shut down when they’re not needed. And, when they are needed, they operate far more efficiently, using only the CPU cycles required. I expect that, in coming years, vendors will provide infrastructure as code, with open APIs and flexible licensing models. These innovations will allow companies to build modular solutions using brick-like components.

The move to “anywhere production” is driving cloud and hybrid deployments, changing how content producers work and are trained, and has a huge impact on the broadcast-technology industry. At Clear-Com, we’re leveraging a component-based approach in which our systems can run on-prem, in the cloud, or in a hybrid fashion. And it’s all very transparent to the user, who just gets the robust Clear-Com experience they’ve come to expect. This approach does change how we build, market, and sell our products, though, and we’ve made some strong alliances with like-minded vendors to make sure our gear is interoperable with the best-in-class production vendors.