Mobile Sports Report

New Atlanta football stadium picks IBM as lead technology integrator

February 19, 2015 by Paul Kapustka

New Atlanta football stadium under construction. Credit all images: New Atlanta Stadium

The yet-to-be named new football stadium under construction in Atlanta has selected IBM as its lead technology integrator, somewhat officially welcoming the new 800-pound gorilla to the stadium technology marketplace.

While computing giant IBM has dabbled in sports deployments before — mainly contributing technology as part of its corporate sponsorship of events like The Masters in golf and the U.S. Open for tennis — only recently has Big Blue gotten into the large-venue technology integration game. And while IBM’s recent deal as technology integrator for the revamp of Texas A&M’s Kyle Field was probably its true debut, for the new Atlanta stadium IBM will lead the selection, design and deployment of a wide range of technologies, including but not limited to the core Wi-Fi and DAS networks that will provide in-venue wireless connectivity.

Due to open in March of 2017, the new $1.4 billion stadium is expected to hold 71,000 fans for football, and up to 83,000 fans for other events like basketball or concerts. And while soccer and concerts and basketball will certainly be part of its events schedule, the NFL Atlanta Falcons and owner Arthur Blank are driving the bus on the new building, picking IBM in part to help satisfy a desire to build a venue that will be second to none when it comes to fan experience.

IBM’s size and experience a draw for Atlanta

Interior stadium design rendering

In addition to Wi-Fi and DAS network buildouts, IBM will design systems to control the expected 2,000-plus digital displays in the planned stadium and will also oversee other technology-related parts of the stadium, including video security, physical door controls and a video intercom system, according to an announcement made today. IBM will also partner with the stadium owners to develop as yet-undetermined applications to “leverage the power of mobility to create a highly contextual, more personalized game day experience for fans, all through the integration of analytics, mobile, social, security and cloud technologies.”

In a phone interview Thursday, Jared Miller, chief technology officer for Blank’s namesake AMB Sports and Entertainment (AMBSE) group, said IBM’s depth and breadth in technology, applications and design made it a somewhat easy choice as lead technology partner.

Miller said the stadium developers looked at the number of different technology systems that would exist within the building, and ideally wanted to identify a single partner to help build and control them all, instead of multiple providers who might just have a single “silo” of expertise.

Proposed stadium exterior

“IBM is unique with its span of technology footprint,” Miller said. He also cited IBM’s ability to not just deploy technology but to also help determine what the technology could be used for, with analytics and application design.

“They’ve looked at the [stadium] opportunity in a different manner, thinking about what we could do with the network once it’s built,” Miller said.

IBM, which also has a sizable consulting business, created a group targeting “interactive experiences” about two years ago, according to Shannon Miller, the North America Fan Experience Lead for the IBM Interactive Experience group. Miller (no relation to Jared Miller), also interviewed by phone Thursday, said IBM had been working with Arthur Blank and the Falcons for more than a year to determine how to make the new stadium “the best fan experience in the world.”

And while IBM is somewhat of a newcomer to the stadium-technology integration game, IBM’s Miller said the company not only understands “how to make digital and physical work together,” but also has resources in areas including innovation, technology development and design that smaller firms may not have. And while the Kyle Field project was ambitious, IBM’s Miller said the Atlanta operation will be much bigger.

“The size and scale of what we’re going to do [in Atlanta] will be unique,” he said.

No suppliers picked yet for Wi-Fi or DAS

For industry watchers, IBM and the Falcons team have not yet picked technology suppliers for discrete parts of the coming wireless network, such as Wi-Fi access points and DAS gear. (Daktronics has already been announced as the supplier of the new planned Halo Screen video board.) But those vendor decisions will likely be coming soon, since the stadium is under a hard deadline to open for the first game of the Major League Soccer season in March of 2017.

“We’re working fast and furious on design, and we want to identify [the gear suppliers] as early as possible,” said AMBSE’s Miller.

IBM and AMBSE did announce that the stadium’s network will be fiber-based, and will probably use Corning as a fiber and Passive Optical Network (PON) technology provider, though that choice was not announced or confirmed. IBM and Corning partnered to install a fiber network core for Wi-Fi and DAS at Texas A&M’s Kyle Field, believed to be the first large fiber network in a large stadium anywhere.

The Atlanta deal puts IBM solidly into the rapidly expanding field of stadium technology integration, which includes companies like CDW (which led network deployments at the University of Nebraska and the University of Phoenix Stadium) as well as stadium ownership groups, like the San Francisco 49ers, and technology name sponsors like AT&T, which has partnered with owners for technology and network deployments at venues like AT&T Park and AT&T Stadium.

Overhead view

Filed Under: Basketball, DAS, NFL, Wi-Fi Tagged With: Atlanta Falcons, CDW, Corning, DAS, iBM, Mobile Sports Report, New Atlanta Stadium, NFL, Paul Kapustka, PON, Stadium Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi

Levis’ Stadium app adds special features for Sharks-Kings outdoor hockey game

February 18, 2015 by Paul Kapustka

Mocked-up screen shot of what the Levi’s Stadium app will look like for Saturday’s outdoor hockey game. Credit: VenueNext

Other than mobile ticketing, all of the regular features of the Levi’s Stadium mobile app will be active for Saturday’s outdoor hockey game between the San Jose Sharks and the Los Angeles Kings, with fans able to use the app over the free Wi-Fi network or the enhanced cellular DAS to do things like watch instant replays, or to order food, drinks and merchandise and have those items delivered to every seat in the 68,500-seat venue.

New for the app as a special treat for fans at the Coors Light NHL Stadium Series event is a “live, crowd-generated light show” experience, using technology from Baltimore, Md.-based Wham City Lights that synchronizes smartphones to produce a mass lighting effect. The app feature will, according to the NHL and the Levi’s app producer VenueNext, “blanket the stadium with a synchronized, multi-colored visualization of the live musical entertainment on the field,” if of course enough fans download the app and activate it at the right time.

Just like Niners fans this past football season, hockey fans at Levi’s Stadium on Saturday will be able to download the free app and use it to watch live streaming video of the event, as well as instant replays from several angles. Fans can also use the app to purchase parking tickets and get directions to the stadium as well as their seating section once inside the venue.

What will be interesting to see is if hockey fans generate more wireless data usage than football fans, a possibility since hockey has two natural built-in mid-game breaks as opposed to football’s halftime. Since the event is also more of a “bucket list” type game than a regular-season football game, the possibility exists that Sharks, Kings and general hockey fans in attendance may break the previous Levi’s data record set at the Niners’ home opener. Stay tuned to MSR next week, when with any luck we’ll get wireless usage stats from the Levi’s Stadium network team.

Filed Under: Apps, DAS, NHL, San Jose Sharks, Wi-Fi Tagged With: DAS, hockey at Levi's Stadium, Levi's Stadium, Levi's Stadium app, Los Angeles Kings, Mobile Sports Report, NHL Stadium Series, outdoor hockey, Paul Kapustka, San Jose Sharks, Stadium Wi-Fi, VenueNext, Wi-Fi

AT&T upgrades DAS at University of Washington hoops arena

February 18, 2015 by Paul Kapustka

Alaska Airlines Arena at Hec Edumunson Pavilion. Credit: University of Washington

AT&T’s deal to bring better wireless connectivity to Pac-12 conference schools expanded into the basketball zone, with announcement of DAS upgrades at the University of Washington’s Alaska Airlines Arena.

Officially and somewhat longwindedly called the Alaska Airlines Arena at Hec Edumunson Pavilion, the cozy 10,000-seat facility is home to not only the Husky men’s and women’s basketball teams, but also hosts other indoor sports like volleyball and gymnastics. According to AT&T the new DAS deployment has more than 80 antennas spread out through the facility to enhance cellular coverage, especially 4G LTE signals.

According to AT&T, the new DAS is already up and running and is seeing an average of 17 gigabytes of traffic used by AT&T customers per basketball game so far this season. Last fall AT&T also announced DAS upgrades at the U-Dub football stadium, where it has roughly 340 DAS antennas and saw an average 190 GB of traffic per game.

Filed Under: 4G LTE, AT&T, Basketball Tagged With: Alaska Airlines Arena, AT&T, DAS, Mobile Sports Report, Paul Kapustka, University of Washington

DGP gets deal to extend DAS outside Levi’s Stadium

February 11, 2015 by Paul Kapustka

Franks and DAS: DGP DAS antennas above food station at Levi’s Stadium. Photo credit: Paul Kapustka, MSR

DAS Group Professionals, the company that installed the neutral-host DAS inside Levi’s Stadium, now has a deal to extend the DAS outside the Levi’s walls, covering parts of the city of Santa Clara, Calif., that surround the stadium.

With next year’s Super Bowl set to take place at Levi’s Stadium, it makes sense that city officials would want to make sure the parking lots and other pre-game gathering areas outside the venue had good cellular connectivity. At the most recent Super Bowl in Glendale, Ariz., neutral host provider Crown Castle did an extensive job of building the “oDAS” or outside DAS in the spaces surrounding the University of Phoenix Stadium.

According to DGP, it will design, build and maintain an oDAS for the City of Santa Clara, initially targeting the area around the Great America theme park and the Santa Clara Convention Center, which sit on the other side of the main Levi’s Stadium parking lots. Like the DAS inside the stadium, access to the network outside the stadium will be offered to all major wireless carriers, who must pay DGP and the city for access to the network.

While the network will definitely come in handy for pre- and post-game connectivity following Levi’s Stadium events, it will also improve overall cellular performance in the area, which is also the home to several large corporate office buildings as well as the busy convention center.

Filed Under: 4G LTE, AT&T, DAS, Super Bowl Tagged With: AT&T, Calif., DAS, DGP, Levi's Stadium, Mobile Sports Report, Paul Kapustka, San Francisco 49ers, Santa Clara, Super Bowl 50, Verizon Wireless

Comcast powers Wi-Fi for Tennessee Titans, Philly’s Wells Fargo Center

February 9, 2015 by Paul Kapustka

Comcast continues to expand its presence in the stadium Wi-Fi marketplace, with announcements that revealed the cable giant’s participation in Wi-Fi networks at both the Tennessee Titans’ LP Field and the Wells Fargo Arena in Comcast’s headquarters hometown of Philadelphia.

In a somewhat confusing press release, Comcast last week revealed that it was the backbone service provider for the Wi-Fi network at LP Field, which was installed by Extreme Networks and was supposed to be live all season. In its press statement, Comcast said its 1 Gigabit per second backbone service would bring LP Field fans “Wi-Fi for the first time,” leading almost every media outlet who reprints press releases to assume that services hadn’t yet been offered at the stadium.

But not MSR.

According to Comcast, the pipe was actually installed before the start of the past football season and as far as we know the Wi-Fi was active all year long, though in an email a Comcast representative claimed that the announcement wasn’t made earlier because the Wi-Fi network “was in a test-phase.” We have emails in to the Titans and to Extreme to see if we can get more clarification on how well the network operated this season; the bottom line good news for Titans fans is that with a 1 Gbps redundant connection in place, the network should have no problems handling game-day wireless traffic.

At the Wells Fargo Center, Comcast announced that it was upgrading the free-to-fans Wi-Fi network that already existed at the venue, adding an unspecified number of Cisco access points to increase coverage. Another 1 Gbps backbone has been installed there, and here’s a press release quote from Comcast to let you know more such deals may be on the way:

“Our goal is to make the Wells Fargo Center a leader in innovative technology and fan interaction,” said Dave Scott, President of Comcast-Spectacor. “This upgrade is just the first of many exciting advancements we will be making at the arena and is a preview of the innovations we can bring to other arenas across the country and in Canada.”

Comcast, as Niners fans may know, provides two of its own 10 Gbps pipes (as well as two more 10 Gbps pipes from another unnamed supplier) as the backbone service for Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif. Comcast also said it supplies backbone bandwidth to facilities for the Denver Broncos, the Jacksonville Jaguars, the Boston Celtics, The Oakland A’s, the Boston Red Sox, the Detroit Tigers and the Atlanta Hawks.

Filed Under: Comcast, Wi-Fi Tagged With: Comcast, Levi's Stadium, LP Field, Mobile Sports Report, Paul Kapustka, Stadium Wi-Fi, Wells Fargo Center, Wi-Fi

Super Bowl XLIX sets new stadium Wi-Fi record with 6.2 Terabytes of data consumed

February 4, 2015 by Paul Kapustka

University of Phoenix Stadium. Credit: Arizona Cardinals.

The Super Bowl is once again the stadium Wi-Fi champ, as fans at Sunday’s Super Bowl XLIX in Glendale, Ariz., used 6.23 terabytes of data during the contest, according to the team running the network at the University of Phoenix Stadium.

The 6.23 TB mark blew past the most recent entrant in the “most Wi-Fi used at a single-day single-stadium event” sweepstakes, the 4.93 TB used at the Jan. 12 College Football Playoff championship game at AT&T Stadium. Prior to that, pro football games this past season at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Calif., and at AT&T Stadium had pushed into the 3-plus TB mark to be among the highest totals ever reported.

The live crowd watching the New England Patriots’ 28-24 victory over the Seattle Seahawks also used about as much cellular data as well, with Verizon Wireless, AT&T and Sprint claiming a combined total of 6.56 TB used in and around the stadium on game day. All three carriers were on the in-stadium and outside-the-stadium DAS deployments being run by neutral host Crown Castle. If those figures are correct (more on this later) it would put the total wireless data usage for the event at 12.79 TB, far and away the biggest single day of wireless data use we’ve ever heard of.

Apple OS updates still the application king

Handrails with Wi-Fi antenna enclosures from AmpThink. Credit: Arizona Cardinals.

Mark Feller, vice president of information technology for the Arizona Cardinals, and Travis Bugh, senior wireless consultant for CDW, provided Mobile Sports Report with the final Wi-Fi usage numbers, which are pretty stunning for anyone in the stadium networking profession. According to Feller the new CDW-deployed Wi-Fi network with Cisco gear at the UoP Stadium saw 2.499 TB of data downloaded, and 3.714 TB uploaded, for a total of 6.213 TB of Wi-Fi usage. Bugh of CDW said there were 25,936 unique devices connecting to the network on game day, with a peak concurrent usage of 17,322, recorded not surprisingly at halftime.

Peak download usage of 1.3 Gbps was recorded before the game’s start, while peak upload usage of 2.5 Gbps was hit at halftime. The top applications by bandwidth use, Feller said, were Apple (mobile update), Facebook, Dropbox and Snapchat.

DAS numbers also set new record, but clarification needed

The only reason we aren’t yet trumpeting the 6.564 TB of reported DAS use as a verified record is due to the differences in clarity from each of the reporting providers. We also haven’t yet heard any usage totals from T-Mobile, so it’s likely that the final final wireless data use number is somewhere north of 13 TB, if all can be believed.

Parking lot light poles, Westgate entertainment district. Can you spot the DAS?

As reported before, AT&T said it saw 1.7 TB of cellular wireless activity from its customers on game day, with 696 GB of that happening inside the stadium, and the balance coming from the outside areas before and after the game. We’d also like to welcome Sprint to the big-game reporting crew (thanks Sprint!), with its total of 754 GB of all 4G LTE traffic used in and around the stadium on game day. According to Sprint representatives, its Super Bowl coverage efforts included 5 COWs (cell towers on wheels) as well as expanded DAS and macro placements in various Phoenix-area locations. The Sprint coverage included the 2.5 GHz spectrum that uses TDD LTE technology.

As also previously reported, Verizon Wireless claimed 4.1 TB of customer traffic in and around the stadium on game day, which Verizon claims is all cellular traffic and does not reflect any Verizon Wireless customer use of the stadium Wi-Fi network. Verizon also reported some other interesting activity tidbits, which included 46,772 Verizon Wireless devices used at the game, of which just 59.7 percent were smartphones. Verizon also said it saw 10 million emails sent on its networks that day, and 1.9 million websites visited, while also seeing 122.308 videos sent or received over wireless connections.

We’re still waiting to see if we can get usage numbers from the Super Bowl stadium app (we’re especially interested to see if the instant replay feature caught on) but the warning for stadium owners and operators everywhere seems to be clear: If you’re hosting the big game (or any BIG game), make sure your network is ready for 6 TB and beyond!

Filed Under: 4G LTE, Apple, AT&T, Cisco, DAS, iPhone, MSR Guides, NFL, Seattle Seahwaks, Sprint, Super Bowl, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi Tagged With: AT&T, COWs, DAS, Dropbox, Mobile Sports Report, New England Patriots, Paul Kapustka, Seattle Seahawks, SnapChat, Sprint, Stadium Wi-Fi, Super Bowl, Super Bowl XLIX, University of Phoenix Stadium, Verizon Wireless, Wi-Fi