Articles

The debate regarding the commercial viability of women's sport is over. Following the watershed moments of the 2023 FIFA World Cup and the gender parity of the 2024 Paris Olympics, the sector is now a multi-billion-dollar industry. This article, featuring exclusive insights from Lianne Sanderson, Caitlin Bassett, and Shannon Tan via This Sporting Planet, explores why the current landscape represents the single greatest investment window in sports media history.

The Premier League's dominance in the media rights market is not an accident; it is the result of a deliberate, 15-year strategy to centralise and perfect its production output. This article, drawing on my tenure as Head of Premier League Productions, explores how creating a "turnkey" content ecosystem made the League the ultimate asset for digital-first giants like Amazon, Apple, and YouTube.

Have you ever tried to explain the rules of Cricket to someone who has never played the game? Golf's scoring system or the offside rule? The laws of sports can be complicated, but they are crucial to playing, understanding and, as a viewer, enjoying the action.

Two years ago, we predicted a Game of Thrones-style war for sports rights. In 2026, the dragons have officially landed. Winter hasn't just come for linear broadcasting; the blizzard is here.

I began my TV career as a tape librarian thirty years ago. During that time, we manually inputted the videotape information onto physical cards. Thankfully, computerisation and digitisation have exponentially improved the quality and quantity of hardware and software applications available to support content collection, tagging and storage. In the past, I would have a few hours to tell my friends about footage and angles of incidents not available to them but which I had seen in the Broadcast Centre before they were aired on TV, but now, people can access these clips instantly before they have left the stadium!

Broadcasters are facing significant challenges within the rapidly evolving media landscape. Declining viewer numbers, audience fragmentation across platforms, and reduced revenue for broadcasters and rightsholders are just a few hurdles. These obstacles are compounded by viewer fatigue and younger audiences consuming sports content through multiple devices. Urgent action is required to address these issues.

‘The money is in the old media, but the future is in the new media’. In a recent podcast, George Pyne, CEO of Bruin Capital, captures the views expressed by many sports executives over the last five years. Still, the question remains: Can New Media generate revenue comparable to Old Media, on which the sports industry depends? For all its benefits, New Media has yet to make a significant revenue contribution to the sports industry, and, in many cases, because of how it is being deployed, it undermines rights holders’ broadcast and sponsorship incomes.

Since publishing the article, The Growing Importance of Virtual Production and Advertising in Sports (see below) in July, LCA has received many calls and enquiries from companies and people developing and selling Virtual Production solutions, brands, and investors interested in virtual advertising. The appetite to adopt virtual solutions is strong, and the technology is improving quickly, creating solutions for multi-camera broadcasts and, most excitingly, the ability to enhance recorded and archive content.

Sports broadcasting is an ever-evolving industry, but production and distribution costs are rising with increasing demands. To help stem this tide, organisations need to turn to technology to support the editorial and commercial demands, and cloud technology is critical in its transformation. For content creation and distribution teams in sports organisations, embracing cloud technology and developing proficiency for live production and distribution will broaden their service offering whilst keeping costs affordable.

In the competitive sports industry, finding new markets and differentiating oneself from competitors is crucial for success. Sports and sales companies often rely on assumptions and stick to tried and tested methods, limiting their potential. This article explores the benefits of adopting the strategy canvas approach, a powerful tool originating from the Blue Ocean Strategy, and how it helps organisations challenge assumptions, embrace clarity, and drive success in the dynamic sports industry.

The era of static perimeter boards is over. As rights holders search for new commercial value, Virtual Advertising and Augmented Reality (AR) have emerged as the next great frontier. This article explores how technology allows federations and broadcasters to split visual feeds for regional markets, unlocking billions in potential revenue, while simultaneously using AI-driven graphics to deepen fan engagement.

The era of AI in sports is no longer a prediction; it is a reality. Following the technological leaps seen during the major sporting events of 2024, the industry is now racing to adapt. This article explores how Artificial Intelligence is not just automating workflows but revolutionising data visualisation, cloud deployment, and revenue generation, offering a competitive edge to those bold enough to embrace it.

The transition from traditional broadcasting to a Web3 and AI-enabled future offers immense potential for fan engagement and revenue. However, history teaches us that sports media evolves gradually, not instantly. This article argues that for rights holders to adopt Blockchain, NFTs, and Cloud workflows successfully, they must pursue an evolutionary strategy—integrating new tools into existing Web2 infrastructures to ensure stability while unlocking the control and personalisation that modern fans demand.