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View from the Editor: No sleeping satellites at SportelDubai - April 2004

The editor's suntan might be fading along with her youth, but her memories of SportelDubai (14-17 March 2004) will be around for a while yet. This may have an insy bit to do with having been dared to give up alcohol for Lent (which apparently is the 40 plus extremely long days and nights between Ash Wednesday and the Easter period - but who is counting?) but also much to do with the buzz of holding the market in an exciting (and mostly gloriously sunny) new venue. Dubai had it all - beaches, luxury hotels and plenty of reasonably-priced gold jewellery. Throw in a Japanese Elvis Presley lookalike singing Tina Turner songs in a Wild West themed bar, the odd camel ride along the sumptuous shores and copious imbibings of (calorie-free) apple-flavoured (shisha) tobacco and you have the perfect ambiance for doing business.
And at SportelDubai, business was certainly done. The inaugural Middle Eastern international television sports programme market attracted 478 participants, representing 243 companies from 48 countries globally. Along with its traditional base of broadcasters, distributors, sports marketing agents, event organisers and acquisition executives, the market also attracted a generous mix of sponsorship and investment groups, internet solutions providers and facilities companies.

John West, TVNZ SS

The talk from the satellite facilities' camp followed two main themes - firstly, who was going to be doing what with whom (and where) at the Athens Olympics and secondly, was all still well in the marriage between TVNZ Satellite Services and Intelsat now the honeymoon period is over? Regular readers of Sport and Technology will remember that the satellite coupling was unveiled (get it?) in the editor's SportelMonaco 2003 review (see View from the Editor: Playing the naming game at SportelMonaco - October 2003).
Six months on however and TVNZ SS has thus far been rebranded rather than renamed. Although we understand that it is de rigeur for a wife not to take her husband's surname these wildly-liberated days, Sport and Technology couldn't help but wonder whether we should be asking for the safe return of our toaster and bathroom towels set? It seems not quite yet. "TVNZ Satellite Services and Intelsat continue to work together to best advantage both companies," says TVNZ SS' executive vice president of broadcast services, John West, when asked about the merger.

Athens 2004 planning

Grant Parkinson, BT Broadcast Services

At the time of writing, TVNZ SS was finalising unilateral requirements for the Asian Broadcasting Union (ABU) and South African clients on its books as well as parent broadcaster TVNZ, before building a transmission plan for the Athens 2004 Olympics. "International federations will have done their event draws by the end of May and then we'll also be able to look in depth at what will be carried on the multilateral services," says West. "We can't decide what services are required until we know when the individual games and events are being played." A master schedule of events will be ready at the end of June at which stage TVNZ SS will sit down with the heads of sport from the ABU, TVNZ, et al to discuss which actual events out of the wide array on offer will be covered. Sport and Technology's vision of fisticuffs, handbags at dawn and/or coin flipping between ABU broadcasters was cruelly dismissed by West as ways of divvying up the spoils. "Everything is done in a very gentlemanly manner which is a credit to the people involved in the process," he explains. "There is an established hierarchy. Medal ceremonies first, then the semi-finals and quarter finals, then the important matches for the countries we are working with - usually in cycling, swimming, gymnastics and boxing. We then trade off the schedules for team sports and start looking for gaps." In West's career, he has only ever had to deal with one conflict where two countries wanted coverage of events being held at the same time. In that case, one of the countries sportingly backed down. "By working collectively, broadcasters can provide greater coverage than they could if they worked individually. And this way they also share costs," he adds.
At Sydney 2000, TVNZ SS serviced eight multilateral channels. At Athens, it will continue its base of eight multilateral channels and also service seven unilateral channels as well as providing additional production facilities. "We will also be using three transponders so that we can use one as high definition [HD] for the opening and closing ceremonies," reveals West.

Services for non-rights holders

Another SportelDubai participant that will also be providing satellite services at the Athens Olympics is BT Broadcast Services. The company worked with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) during the Sydney 2000 games highlighting the fact that it has previously tended to work with unilateral broadcasters at major sports events. "But this time around we are taking a different approach," says Grant Parkinson, sales manager of major events for BT Broadcast Services. The company has combined forces with Woods TV, PPV, Video Europe Projects and Outside Broadcast to create International Sports Television Services (ISTS). The consortium will offer a one-stop shop filled with production and facilities services to non-rights holders in Athens, "although the facilities won't be exclusively for non-rights holders," adds Parkinson. "We have seen other outfits entering the non-rights holders space and we thought we would give it a try too. Whether there's enough work for everyone though, we won't know until we are there, but for BT not to be out there in some capacity would be wrong."
On the issue of facilities companies setting up at Athens to service non-rights holders, one SportelDubai delegate whispered covertly to Sport and Technology: "They [the facilities companies] are all walking down the aisle, but no-one seems to have said 'yes' to them yet." Hoping very much that it's not a case of 'always the bridesmaid and never the bride', a consortium comprising Globecast, Gearhouse and Stefi Productions known as Athens Broadcast Services will also be offering services for non-rights holders in a base close to the main Olympic stadium (see News - August 2003).
Both BT's Parkinson and TNNZ SS' West agree that many broadcasters are leaving it rather late in the day to lease their satellite capacity - end-December 2003 should ideally have been the latest. "There will always be some broadcasters who pre-book," adds Parkinson, "but there will always be others who come down during the actual event depending on what stories break, how important or scandalous they are, or how well their teams do. So inevitably there's always a degree of uncertainty in a venture like this." ISTS will have two locations in Athens for its services - on the roof of Athenian consortium member production company PPV, and another in downtown Athens with the Acropolis as a stunning backdrop.
Before that, BT Broadcast Services will be showcasing its wares - including some HD experimentation - at the UEFA European Championships in Portugal in June through a venture with UK rights-holding terrestrial broadcaster ITV Sport. "We will be supplying four uplink units," explains Parkinson, "three of which will follow the matches around the country and the fourth will stay at the England team hotel." (But alas not in David Beckham's hotel room). "A lot of broadcasters are going for full diversity," adds Parkinson in relation to BT Broadcast Services' range of services. "In the past they would have all used satellite, whereas now they are also taking fibre as well which means they can get their pictures terrestrially if anything goes wrong. It adds that degree of comfort."

Looking skywards

The Editor tests the theory that the take-up of satellite services is directly related to instances of scandal (please note that only apples were harmed in the making of this particular tobacco)

We are certainly not strangers to comfort at Sport and Technology - indeed the softest of slippers are never far from our cosy feet. We also welcome presents into the bosom of our offices like old friends. Recently, we were kindly furnished with a collection of Schott's Original Miscellany, which includes gems such as useful Cockney Rhyming Slang phrases and some rather urbane nouns of assemblage. Look out for "a malapertness of peddlers" and "a murmuration of starlings" in future issues of the newsletter. (If we can figure out how to get them in that is. Please send us examples of your best collective noun sentences to the e-mail address below and we will steal them for our own use). If Sport and Technology attends the Cowes Week Regatta again this year, we look forward to seeing a veritable - wait for it - wait for it - "suit of sails". Duh Dum! We thank you.
Anyway, collective musings aside, the Miscellany also lists some interesting phobias. Our favourite, and deliciously pertinent to the topic of this column this month, is Keraunothnetophobia, which of course (!) is the fear of satellites falling out of the sky. Visions of paranoid sports fans rushing around the Athens Olympics with reinforced umbrellas (logo-free of course) made the Sport and Technology editorial team chuckle with uncontrollable mirth. But then again, who are we to mock when we can't even pronounce Keraunothnetophobia while sober. Keranno, Keranoutho, Keanu, Cyrano… oh we give up.

This month's mention of darts

Talking of sober, despite remaining alcohol-free and therefore virtuously smug when subsequently hangover-free throughout SportelDubai, the editor still managed to pick up an injury. But because it involved a giant cardboard poster of her darts idol Phil 'The Power' Taylor falling on her foot, it was one she was prepared to forgive (and possibly repeat). And no, she wasn't trying to steal it for the Sport and Technology offices (it would never have fitted into her suitcase, let alone under her pillow), she was helping Matchroom's head of international sales Karen Manzi, dismantle the Matchroom exhibition stand. Honest guv! Would you Adam and Eve it? Altruism is the editor's middle name where Phil Taylor is concerned. (I will stop referring to myself in the third person now in case my imaginary friend gets jealous).
Sadly, that's all for this month readers. I'm off to pour myself a tall glass of sparkling water before I 'Ball and Chalk' up the 'Apples and Pears' to fix my sun-ravaged 'Barnet Fair'. Apologies to any readers with a phobia of Cockney Rhyming Slang or the BBC soap opera EastEnders (or 'BornoutsidethesoundofBowBellsophobia' as we like to call it at our salubrious offices in the very civilised North London. We're more likely to be photographed consuming jellied-vodka than jellied-eels around these parts. Well, after Easter that is).

Rachael Church - Editor

If you have any comments or feedback on this article or any of the features in Sport and Technology, we would be delighted to hear from you. Please e-mail your comments to editor@sportandtechnology.com

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