Grass Valley IP Technology Powers NBC Sports Stamford HQ

NBC Sports Group continues to lead the industry with innovative new IP production workflows, supplied by Grass Valley, at its headquarters in Stamford, CT. The approach harnesses the power of open-architecture IP technology to unlock an unprecedented level of scalability and flexibility, delivering a ‘better than being there’ experience for viewers around the globe.

Leveraging the Dynamic IP Blueprint from Grass Valley, NBC Sports has quickly revamped its infrastructure to meet the new demands of live sports, and beyond.  The cornerstone of this blueprint is Grass Valley’s Dynamic System Orchestrator GV Orbit, enabling powerful new IP workflows not possible with any other solution on the market.  GV Orbit is a unique configuration, control and monitoring solution specifically designed for the dynamic orchestration of broadcast media networks across SDI, hybrid or pure IP – ideal for companies wherever they are in their transition to IP.

 “With the return of live sports and major events, we need to ensure we have the best technology available capable of spinning up and down as sports events peak,” said Tim Canary, NBC Sports’ Vice President, Engineering. “Part of NBC’s roadmap was to upgrade our routing topology at the Stamford site by 2023, and the relocation of our GOLF Channel Headquarters last year accelerated that project. We wanted to adopt a standards-based routing system that would enable us to evolve and add more functionality over time as needed. Grass Valley has been a trusted technology partner for years and we were impressed with their latest innovations in IP technology, making this an easy choice. The GV Orbit technology was built from the ground up for the demands of live production in an IP environment and Grass Valley has been a true partner throughout this entire technology transformation.”

NBC Sports expanded beyond the core orchestration layer with Grass Valley’s Dynamic Software Processing solutions including the Dual Channel 4K UHD Format Converter SDI-IP Hybrid Application XIP-3901-UDC-IF, the Kaleido-IP Multiviewer and Audio Live Processor maximi zing the benefit of the new IP technology.  These Dynamic Software Processing solutions pair with GV Orbit providing agile and responsive processing in the demanding environment of live sports production.  When combined with Dynamic Pathfinding and Dynamic Resource Management in GV Orbit, this unlocks a whole new level of production agility.

Lukas Zahas, NBC Sports’ Manager of Broadcast Technology, added, “Grass Valley’s commitment to innovative, open-architecture infrastructure has been a huge benefit for us. The Dynamic IP Blueprint empowers us to build, configure and change systems on-the-fly.”

 “Sports broadcasters are facing the relentless demand of producing content for a diverse and growing range of platforms – all while maintaining their quality and cost standards.  Open-architecture IP technology provides the power to meet this challenge,” commented Sydney Lovely, Grass Valley’s CTO.  “As the founding member of AIMS, Grass Valley prides itself on innovative and interoperable solutions that set the standard for the industry.  We are honored that NBC Sports has once again placed their trust in GV to bring this most valuable content to the world.”