Stadium Tech Report — NFL stadium technology reports — NFC North

Editor’s note: The following team-by-team capsule reports of NFL stadium technology deployments are an excerpt from our most recent Stadium Tech Report, THE FOOTBALL ISSUE. To get all the capsules in one place as well as our featured reports, interviews and analysis, download your free copy of the full report today.

NFC NORTH

Reporting by Chris Gallo

Chicago Bears
Soldier Field
Seating Capacity: 61,500
Wi-Fi – Yes, 175 access points
DAS – Yes, 220 access points
Beaconing – No

Soldier FieldAn unexpected experiment tested Soldier Field’s connectivity in 2013. Severe weather delayed the Ravens and Bears Nov. 17 tilt for two hours, meaning fans were reaching for their phones all at once to stay connected. The wireless activity doubled in this time period, but Solider Field handled it with ease. Boingo and AT&T boosted the stadium’s DAS with more than 220 new antennas. Combine that with 175 Wi-Fi access points, and one of the NFL’s oldest stadiums is well-connected. However, it will cost fans to be connected – $1.99 per day or $7.95 for the monthly Boingo fee.

Detroit Lions
Ford Field
Seating Capacity: 65,000
Wi-Fi-Yes
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

The Detroit Lions have one of the more exciting offenses in the NFL. And now fans will be able to share that excitement as Verizon brings Wi-Fi to Ford Field in 2014. It’s a major upgrade for a stadium that enters in 12th season. Will the improvement spill over onto the field, and have the Lions host their first playoff game since 1994?

Green Bay Packers
Lambeau Field
Seating Capacity: 80,735
Wi-Fi – No
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

The oldest home stadium in the NFL is still a memorable place to catch a game. But after the Packers needed corporate sponsors to sell out last year’s home playoff game against the San Francisco 49ers, the organization is planning more upgrades. The Packers are in the middle of another multi-million dollar renovation that improves scoreboards, increases capacity, and has plans to add Wi-Fi to the stadium in the near future.

Minnesota Vikings
TCF Bank Stadium
Seating Capacity: 52,000
Wi-Fi – Limited / in select areas only
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

The Vikings are headed for the outdoors in 2014 and 2015. While the organization’s new digs are being built, the team will play at TCF Bank Stadium – home of the Minnesota Golden Gophers. While not available throughout the stadium, there is some Wi-Fi present (in suites and club areas), as well as a new DAS upgrade from AT&T.

Stadium Tech Report — NFL stadium technology reports — AFC West

Editor’s note: The following team-by-team capsule reports of NFL stadium technology deployments are an excerpt from our most recent Stadium Tech Report, THE FOOTBALL ISSUE. To get all the capsules in one place as well as our featured reports, interviews and analysis, download your free copy of the full report today.

AFC WEST

Reporting by Chris Gallo

Denver Broncos
Sports Authority Field at Mile High
Seating Capacity: 76,125
Wi-Fi-Yes
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

When Sports Authority Field at Mile High is at full capacity (76,125) on game days, the stadium is the 14th largest city in Colorado. And it’s a well-connected one too. Because the Denver Broncos deliver TE Connectivity DAS and a Verizon-built Wi-Fi network to the stadium. On the Wi-Fi side, Sprint should be joining this season, allowing its customers to join Verizon’s with free Wi-Fi access. Verizon, which has added Wi-Fi APs in strategic spots around the facility, has also added an additional 180 DAS antennas to its network. AT&T customers use a separate DAS at Sports Authority, and Sprint is also adding to its DAS deployment with more antennas.

Kansas City Chiefs
Arrowhead Stadium
Seating Capacity: 76,416
Wi-Fi – Yes, 600+ access points
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

On a quest to challenge the HD experience at home, Chiefs president Mark Donovan delivered Wi-Fi and a mobile app to Arrowhead Stadium last season. Chiefs fans will continue to be able to share status updates and check fantasy lineups on game days in 2014. Let’s see if the support helps Kansas City make the playoffs for consecutive seasons for the first time since 1994-1995.

Oakland Raiders
O.Co Coliseum
Seating Capacity: 56,057
Wi-Fi – No
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

The Raiders enter 2014 seeking their first winning season in over a decade. The fans will have to cheer their team on without Wi-Fi for another year at O.Co Coliseum. Despite being available for A’s fans, when the stadium capacity increases by almost 20,000 people for football, Raiders faithful are left without any access.

San Diego Chargers
Qualcomm Stadium
Seating Capacity: 70,561
Wi-Fi – No
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

The stadium that’s named after the wireless giant remains a mystery. Because Wi-Fi in Qualcomm Stadium, a facility whose sponsor’s fortunes come mainly from the sale of wireless-phone silicon, is still absent. The stadium that hosted the Super Bowl over a decade ago does have DAS antennas courtesy of AT&T for improved cell coverage.

Stadium Tech Report: With advanced wireless network and app, Baylor brings ‘NFL Experience’ to McLane Stadium

McLane Stadium, Baylor University. Credit all photos: Baylor University

McLane Stadium, Baylor University. (click on any photo for larger image) Credit all photos: Baylor University

Just a few years ago, the Baylor University football program wasn’t a topic of national conversation. But now after a Heisman trophy, a Big 12 championship and perennial top rankings, Baylor is doing its best to stay at the front of the college football pack — and that effort extends to its new stadium, where Baylor has put in place a wireless network and a feature-filled app designed to bring an “NFL experience” to the Waco, Texas campus.

Now in its first season at the brand-new McLane Stadium, Baylor is already delivering an in-stadium fan technology experience that, like the team itself, ranks highly in the nation. Thanks to a Wi-Fi deployment from Extreme Networks, a DAS from AT&T and a new stadium app from sports-app leader YinzCam, Baylor is able to bring high-quality wireless connectivity to all parts of the 45,140-seat facility, along with advanced app features like live and on-demand streaming action video, as well as seating and parking maps for the new facility.

Like the recently opened Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., Baylor had an advantage with McLane Stadium in being able to make technology part of the original design, instead of having to retrofit it in later. “It’s an amazing opportunity to have a new stadium and be able to plan for technology from the bottom up,” said Pattie Orr, Baylor’s vice president for information technology and Dean of university libraries, in a recent phone interview. “It sure is nice to have technology in mind from the beginning.”

The house that RG3 built

McLane Stadium - Opening Game Day vs SMU

McLane Stadium – Opening Game Day vs SMU

But just like the Baylor team, the plan for the new stadium and its technology underpinnings had to come together quickly. Even late in the 2011 season, when then-Baylor quarterback Robert Griffin III was just starting to turn heads with his on-field heroics, the idea of building a new football facility on campus hadn’t yet been formally approved. In 2011, Baylor still played games in Floyd Casey Stadium, a 50,000-seat facility that opened in 1950, located about four miles from campus.

And then, RG3 happened. As many people associated with Baylor will tell you, when the Bears and Griffin quickly vaulted into the national consciousness — especially after a dramatic RG3-led win over Oklahoma and his subsequent winning of the Heisman trophy — the push for a new stadium quickly gathered steam. (For more background, read this excellent history of the stadium’s origin from the Waco Tribune-Herald.)

“Two years ago we still weren’t sure the stadium was coming,” said Bob Hartland, associate vice president for IT infrastructure, who also participated in the phone interview. “Then there was the Heisman trophy, and everything started becoming a reality.”

After the university gave its formal approval in July of 2012, planning for the $266-million facility could begin — with Orr and Hartland’s tech team having to employ a bit of crystal-ball thinking.

“We knew we needed to deliver for mobile devices,” said Hartland. “The hard thing was trying to predict what was going to happen 2 years out [when the stadium would open].”

Pattie Orr, VP of IT for Baylor

Pattie Orr, VP of IT for Baylor

Bringing an ‘NFL experience’ to Waco

And even though Baylor is private and smaller than its Big 12 conference competitors, the IT team made no small plans. “We wanted an NFL experience,” Orr said. To her, that meant an interactive mobile app that delivered live video to each and every seat.

“The best thing we could do was be forward looking,” said Orr. “What we pictured was, ‘could we have it in our hands?’ In the stadiums of the past, fans loved the big screens, and they still do. But there’s nothing like having it right in the palm of your hand.”

Orr said the Baylor IT team visited some existing stadiums with advanced networks, like AT&T Stadium and Gillette Stadium, as part of a technology vetting process. Eventually the Baylor IT department whittled the Wi-Fi selection down to three different approaches — one that included under-the-seat antennas, one that proposed an under-the-concrete solution, and one that relied mainly on overhead APs. That final one, from Wi-Fi provider Extreme Networks, became the winning bid, in part because the Baylor team liked its less-intrusive technology.

If you look closely under the overhangs, you can see Wi-Fi APs

If you look closely under the overhangs, you can see Wi-Fi APs

“Overhead [APs] are just less intrusive, operationally,” said Hartland, noting the need to drill holes in concrete and do special cleaning or weather-hardening for under-the-seat APs. If you look at McLane, you can see multiple overhang areas around the entire seating bowl, which facilitates overhead AP placements. According to news reports, the Extreme Wi-Fi deployment has 330 APs.

Baylor’s Orr also liked the Extreme Purview Wi-Fi analytics software, which provides detailed views of network usage.

“Analytics provide what you need to know,” Orr said. “If you’re in the dark on the fan experience, and don’t know which apps are being used, how can you tune it or make it better?”

On the DAS side, Baylor went with AT&T as the neutral host, though AT&T already has signed up main competitor Verizon Wireless as a client, meaning that the two largest providers of cellular service have enhanced coverage at McLane Stadium through the AT&T DAS, which reportedly has 486 antennas.

“Our goal was a high-density solution, for both cellular and Wi-Fi,” Orr said.

Solving for the standing-on-the-seat problem

Wi-Fi "coach" helps out at McLane Stadium.

Wi-Fi “coach” helps out at McLane Stadium.

While the network has been an early success — Orr said Baylor is already seeing Wi-Fi take rates as high as 33 percent of all attendees at games so far this season — there have also been a few interesting fixes that have been necessary, including re-tuning Wi-Fi APs to get around the interference quirk of students standing on their seats.

Call it technology meeting tradition, with tradition winning: A Baylor tradition to have underclass students standing for the whole game turned into students standing on top of seats at their new section in McLane Stadium — a shift that led to unexpected interference with the original Wi-Fi antenna placements. (One of the quirks of Wi-Fi networks is that the water inside human bodies is a very effective blocker of Wi-Fi signals.)

“We had not anticipated the students standing on seats, and that extra 20 inches really made a difference,” Hartland said. According to another story in the local paper, large band instruments also blocked Wi-Fi signals. Hartland said that since the original problems the IT team and Extreme have developed work-arounds and new antenna placements to fix the issue.

“It’s pretty fantastic that our students are so excited,” said Orr of the standing-interference issue. “You don’t see things like that much at the NFL level.”

Live video and app ‘coaches’

On the app side, Baylor went with YinzCam, a company with numerous stadium apps under its belt for all the top U.S. professional leagues. YinzCam, like Extreme, is also a partner with the NFL, giving YinzCam an edge in winning NFL stadium deployments.

Like other stadium apps, the Baylor In-Game app from YinzCam features multiple camera-angle choices for replays and live streaming video, as well as a host of stats and other team information. Important to Baylor and its new stadium are maps that help direct fans to parking areas, as well as to specialty concession stands in a facility that is new to everyone this season.

Using the app at McLane Stadium

Using the app at McLane Stadium

“We have some well-known smoked onion rings [at the stadium] and the app can help fans find which stands are selling them and how to get there,” Orr said. The parking feature on the app, she said, can send text directions to fans. Also special to Baylor is a “brick finder,” an app that lets fans who participated in a stadium fundraiser find where the brick with their name on it is.

One more NFL-like feature with a collegiate twist is Baylor’s embrace of the Extreme “Wi-Fi coaches” program, which has network-knowledgeable staff members walking around stadiums in highly visible gear offering hands-on help with connectivity and stadium app use. While Extreme has used the coaches program at pro venues like New England and Philadelphia, at Baylor Orr took advantage of in-house “talent,” using students in the MIS program as roaming “coaches,” giving them some real-world experience at network troubleshooting and customer service.

“We put them [the student coaches] in bright vests and have them stationed near concession stands, to offer a friendly face,” Orr said. “They’re terrific, and they give us real-time feedback.”

Orr said Baylor also has a journalism department student intern leading the technology team’s social media effort, which encourages fans to tweet out problems or questions they might have.

“With my gray hair I’m not too good on social media, but one thing I learned is that we need to embrace it,” said Orr. Hartland said that YinzCam reps told Baylor they “just need to get out there” on social media to support the app, and he reports pleasant surprises when the IT team tweets back.

“On social media, [fans] don’t expect to be contacted,” Hartland said. “They really appreciate it when we get back to them.”

Stadium Tech Report — NFL stadium technology reports — AFC East

Editor’s note: The following team-by-team capsule reports of NFL stadium technology deployments are an excerpt from our most recent Stadium Tech Report, THE FOOTBALL ISSUE. To get all the capsules in one place as well as our featured reports, interviews and analysis, download your free copy of the full report today.

AFC EAST

Reporting by Chris Gallo

Buffalo Bills
Ralph Wilson Stadium
Seating Capacity: 71,757
Wi-Fi – No
DAS – Yes, 200 antennas
Beaconing – No

The Buffalo Bills have had a busy offseason. After the passing of longtime owner Ralph Wilson, the organization was bought by Buffalo husaband-and-wife team of Terry and Kim Pegula for $1.4 billion. Even while the future of the team was uncertain, the stadium named after its longtime owner became fan-friendlier. New gates to enter the stadium, HD video boards, and increased cell service are just a few of the improvements. No Wi-Fi, but Ralph Wilson Stadium does have over 200 DAS antennas.

New England Patriots
Gillette Stadium
Seating Capacity: 68,756
Wi-Fi-Yes
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – No

The New England Patriots are doing everything to get fans off the couch and in Gillette Stadium, with Wi-Fi outfitted by Extreme Networks, a team-centric Game Day Live mobile app, and a squad that’s won the AFC East 5 years in a row. Is it time for another Patriots Super Bowl run?

Miami Dolphins
Sun Life Stadium
Seating Capacity: 75,540
Wi-Fi – Yes, 1,100 access points
DAS-Yes
Beaconing – Yes

Near the end of the 2013 season, Sun Life Stadium became one of the NFL’s first venues to feature beacon technology. The Qualcomm Gimbal contextual awareness platform delivers coupons for concessions as fans walk by and alerts them of shorter wait times on the concourse. Plus, AT&T upgraded the stadium with more than 1,100 Wi-Fi access points and DAS antennas a year ago. All of this has the Dolphins delivering one of the better wireless game day experiences. The search to find a new Dan Marino, however, is still a work in progress.

New York Jets
MetLife Stadium
Seating Capacity: 82,500
Wi-Fi – Yes, 850 access points
DAS – Yes, over 600 antennas
Beaconing – No

There are lots of benefits to hosting a Super Bowl – including the improved connectivity of your stadium. After AT&T and Verizon spent over a year outfitting MetLife Stadium with their own DAS deployments, the stadium saw a 60 percent increase in wireless data from the previous Super Bowl. Safe to say the stadium is well-equipped to easily connect fans with 850 Wi-Fi access points and more than 600 DAS antennas. MetLife Stadium enters its fourth season and continues to make the fan experience unforgettable. Now can the Jets make 2014 an unforgettable season and find their way back to the playoffs?

Seahawks, Verizon tap Extreme for CenturyLink Field Wi-Fi

Wi-Fi access point antennas visible on poles. All photos, credit: Extreme Networks/Seattle Seahawks.

Wi-Fi access point antennas visible on poles. All photos, credit: Extreme Networks/Seattle Seahawks.

Ending one of the bigger stadium Wi-Fi mysteries of 2014, the Seattle Seahawks and Verizon announced today that they are using Extreme Networks Wi-Fi gear and analytics software to power the new Wi-Fi network at CenturyLink field in Seattle, home of the defending Super Bowl champion Seattle Seahawks.

While the network has (reportedly) been live since the start of the NFL regular season, today’s press release is the first official confirmation that the network exists from Verizon or the Seahawks. Previously, Mobile Sports Report had confirmed the network’s existence in an exclusive interview with the NFL’s CIO, Michelle McKenna-Doyle, where McKenna-Doyle said she had helped set up the connection between Verizon and CenturyLink. But no specifics on gear suppliers or breadth and depth of network were available until today.

According to Norman Rice, senior vice president of corporate development at Extreme Networks, CenturyLink Field is the sixth NFL stadium to use Extreme’s IndentFi high-density Wi-Fi gear for its Wi-Fi network, joining deployments by the New England Patriots, the Philadelphia Eagles, the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Tennessee Titans and the Cincinnati Bengals. All six franchises including Seattle will also use Extreme’s Purview analytics software, which helps provide Wi-Fi usage patterns and connectivity information that allows network administrators to fine tune the network.

We are scheduled to speak with some of the CenturyLink Field IT folks today so we will update this post with more info, including (we hope) a Wi-Fi access point count and some more details about the Seahawks app, which apparently has some nifty live video and replay features. Verizon has also said it has installed a DAS at CenturyLink, but there is no information on whether or not it is a neutral DAS and if so whether or not other carriers are on it.

Below are some more photos of the Wi-Fi install, including a railing antenna… more info soon.

Railing AP

Railing AP

More pole-mounted Wi-Fi gear.

More pole-mounted Wi-Fi gear.

AT&T: DAS network also set traffic records for 2014 World Series games at AT&T Park

Giants CIO Bill Schlough (left) talks with workers in the park's main DAS head end facility.

Giants CIO Bill Schlough (left) talks with workers in the park’s main DAS head end facility.

In addition to the over-the-top Wi-Fi usage numbers, it turns out that the in-stadium AT&T cellular network also experienced record usage during the recent World Series games at AT&T Park, with Saturday night’s crowd using 477 Gigabytes of data, according to AT&T.

In case you’re not familiar with the DAS acronym, it stands for distributed antenna system, and basically is a network of small antennas that bring cellular service to the tightly packed fans inside stadiums or other large public venues. At AT&T Park, AT&T runs the network as a neutral host, meaning that Verizon Wireless, Sprint and T-Mobile customers can also use the DAS to connect. If you’re in the park and you haven’t enabled your device to connect via Wi-Fi, you’re probably connected via the DAS. However, the stats provided here are only for AT&T customers on the DAS, since AT&T doesn’t have visibility into the other carriers’ metrics. Since the Wi-Fi network is open to all, the Wi-Fi numbers we reported earlier are for all customers, no matter who their provider is.

But even just the AT&T cellular numbers are pretty impressive, perhaps not surprisingly so since a good-weather World Series game is a bucket-list event for most attendees, meaning that texts, tweets, selfies and Vines were likely flowing freely at all three games in San Francisco. Here’s a breakdown from AT&T about how much more data was used during the games last weekend:

— Fans used an average of approximately 447GB of data per game over the weekend on the AT&T cellular network. This is equivalent to more than 1.27M social media post with photos.

— The numbers represent an increase of approximately 29 percent in cellular data usage compared to the average game during the League Championship series vs. St. Louis.

— It’s an increase of approximately 109 percent in cellular data usage compared to the average game during the final home series of the regular season vs. San Diego (9/25-9/28).

— The peak hour of data usage during three home games was on 10/25 was from 5-6pm PT, the hour in which the first pitch occurred. In this hour more than 83GB of data crossed the AT&T venue-specific cellular network.

According to AT&T, the total combined Wi-Fi and AT&T DAS traffic hit a record high of 2.09 Terabytes on Oct. 25, the highest single-game total in AT&T Park network history. What would be even more interesting would be if we could get DAS statistics from Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile to get the total-total number for wireless data consumed during the biggest games of the year.