Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2019 — A roundup of some of the key sports technology news you need to know, including SportTechie’s own content and stories from around the web.
- The European Tour will monitor pace of play via a GPS tracking system at this week’s BMW PGA Championship in England. The tracking device will be placed on one golf bag in each group, and when that group completes a hole, information regarding its position will be relayed to officials. The Tour’s new regulations will increase fines for violating pace of play rules, and displays showing how each group is doing will be installed on every hole in 2020.
- Global sailing league SailGP is launching eSailGP in partnership with Virtual Regatta, an online race simulator Virtual Regatta, and World Sailing, the sport’s governing body. Users can play eSailGP for free on desktop, iOS and Android devices. The game’s virtual boats aim to match the look and performance of the real boats that race in SailGP. “Esports are no longer the future, but rather the now, which is why we made it an immediate priority to engage this potentially massive audience,” SailGP CEO Russell Coutts said in a press release.
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- DirecTV will televise 11 Thursday Night Football games in 4K resolution this season. The high-definition broadcasts will start with the Week 4 matchup between the Eagles and Packers on Sept. 26, and continue every Thursday through Week 15’s Jets-Ravens contest on Dec. 12 . Before the beginning of this season, DirectTV’s parent company AT&T elected to remove the NFL Network channel from its AT&T U-Verse and DirectTV Now services. The transition to 4K comes at a time when the NFL is talking with tech companies about the NFL Sunday Ticket package that DirectTV currently owns through 2022.
- Streaming service Sling TV will broadcast exclusive La Liga shoulder programming for North American subscribers. During the current season, Sling TV will feature weekly segments from La Liga-produced analysis shows hosted by former soccer players Luis Garcia and Jimmy Conrad. Garcia’s show will air in Spanish and Conrad’s in English. The partnership also creates an ambassadors’ club that offers live meet and greets with former players and player Q&A’s via Facebook Live. Sling TV currently broadcasts all La Liga regular season matches via beIN Sports in both English and Spanish.
- Sports media company Whistle has partnered with Otro, a U.K.-based company focused on soccer content. Whistle will help Otro launch a new YouTube channel, and the companies will co-produce content for their social and digital platforms. Otro’s talent roster includes soccer stars such as David Beckham, Lionel Messi, Zinedine Zidane, Neymar Jr. and Eric Cantona. Whistle will also launch and manage Otro’s online merchandise store as part of the deal. Whistle, formally known as Whistle Sports, raised a $28 million Series D funding round last year.
- The Video Game Entertainment & News Network plans to launch in 2020, having secured a $17 million seed round. VENN will be a 24/7 gaming and esports network that will broadcast live from studios in New York City and Los Angeles. The network was co-founded by Ariel Horn, a former producer at Riot Games and NBC Sports, as well as angel investor Ben Kusin, whose father founded GameStop. VENN’s investors include aXiomatic Gaming, Riot Games co-founder Mark Merrill, Blizzard Entertainment co-founder Mike Morhaime and Twitch co-founder Kevin Lin. “VENN will be everywhere the gaming audience consumes content: Streaming platforms, VOD, 24/7 linear and social networks,” Horn said in a press release. “Pioneering a truly interactive broadcast network will enable the kind of experiences these audiences demand.”
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