Can a stadium be agile?

Stadiums may be thousands of tons of concrete and steel, but they now need to be agile. In the era of smartphones, signaling storms, sports bars, home theaters, and rising ticket prices, simply providing in-stadium watching experience is not enough. Dortmund Football Club saw 80,000 audience come to the stadium and 250,00 followers added on Facebook and 50,000 on Twitter during the week of Cup Final. The challenge for stadium operators and sports franchises is: How do we enhance digital experience at the stadium and engage fans outside the stadium with the club?

Benedikt Scholz, Head of Business Development & International Relations of Borussia Dortmund, Sander Van Stiphout, Director of Amsterdam ArenA International, and Jerzy Wasowicz, Group VP of Sales of FanPlay (a provider of a football fan engagement platform) discuss how ICT technology has helped enhance viewing experience both inside and outside the stadiums as well as increasing club revenues.

By Linda Xu

Stadiums may be thousands of tons of concrete and steel, but they now need to be agile. In the era of smartphones, signaling storms, sports bars, home theaters, and rising ticket prices, being there at the stadium may not be as alluring as it once was, and it is up to sports franchises and stadium operators to get it back. Benedikt Scholz, Head of Business Development & International Relations of Borussia Dortmund, Sander Van Stiphout, Director of Amsterdam ArenA International, and Jerzy Wasowicz, Group VP of Sales of FanPlay (a provider of a football fan engagement platform) discuss how

Ambassadors of the club

Second-screen is now a way of life for connected fans, even when the primary screen isn’t a screen at all but a soccer pitch. If the network is overloaded at the stadium, fans might save their hard-earned money and stay home next time. According to Sander Van Stiphout, “People can watch matches on television comfortably on the couch at home with their own drinks and company. So we try to make the stadium as attractive as possible. We are going to offer free Wi-Fi access within our stadium, so everybody can have access to Facebook and other kinds of applications. If they upload photos and videos, their friends somewhere will see it. The fans will become ambassadors of the club. We are expecting that this will drive our business.”

However, simply flooding the grounds with radio waves is not enough. Stakeholders need to create a seamless network that spans the stadium and franchise ecosystem, and incentivize its use. According to Jerzy Wasowicz, his company’s FanPlay platform now offers “access to football game statistics, chatting with friends, uploading your photos, and sending email.” “If fans come to the stadium for the first time, and check into our WLAN system, we can immediately provide them with ticket information for the next match day, if there are still some available,” adds Benedikt Scholz.

A vital part of any stadium ecosystem will of course be video. Scholz emphasizes, “Borussia Dortmund allows all 80,667 spectators to have Wi-Fi access at the stadium. Our plan is to allow 30,000 users’ concurrent video access.” Sander Van Stiphout shares, “51,000 will be able to access the network; 10,000 of them, roughly 20% of them, will be able to watch video simultaneously. We are also thinking of making applications where game watchers can also be the broadcasters of the match. They can record the match for 180 degrees from two sides and upload the video onto the Internet instantly.” However, the video content is not all free of charge. “The content like live video and video playback of premium content wouldn't be available if you wouldn't be willing to pay for the subscription of episodes,” explains Jerzy Wasowicz, discussing how to monetize those value-added contents on the FanPlay platform.

However, just as stadiums have different tiers for seating, so can wireless access. Jerzy Wasowicz emphasizes “We should prioritize giving different levels of access to network and bandwidth connectivity depending on, for instance, somebody who is an annual ticket holder or just on a one-off visit.”

Sander Van Stiphout would add, “Amsterdam ArenA will offer high-bandwidth services like video streaming to everybody, especially our highly valued customers, who will have more opportunities to enjoy more services. The system actually allows us to direct more bandwidth to them for a better experience.”

Another area that should see a boost is onsite shopping. Fans can make food and beverage orders remotely, which are forwarded to the nearest collection point, so that the time spent waiting in lines is cut back significantly. Merchandise sales should also see a boost, as the degree of personalization will go up dramatically. In Sander Van Stiphout’s opinion, “It is great when you enter the stadium and order a shirt with your name printed on the back of your favorite team that plays in the stadium like Ajax, and somebody will deliver it to you during halftime. This will help drive our revenues.”

A resource for sponsors

Sponsors are looking to connected stadiums as a means to engage with fans and media. “Sponsors can run lotteries or quizzes during halftime. They can interact with fans directly. Obviously, this is an advantage for fans as well because entertainment at the stadium might be even better. They can win prizes. Sponsors can benefit from that as well,” says Benedikt Scholz.

Jerzy Wasowicz sees even more potential through sponsor involvement. “The data delivered to the potential sponsor of the club is quite powerful because sponsors can actually quantify the real value of their fan base and justify the additional sponsorship they may wish to gain. They are interested in understanding this sort of information from the very basic level - the location of potential fans within the stadium, to what types of things they buy, how they buy, and what kinds of services they expect within the venue.” He would later add, “There is some data available to justify the successful implementation of mobile payment technology in the market. Coupons are ten times more likely to be monetized or used if they are actually done on fans’ mobile phones. Sponsors are preparing loyalty schemes. Engagement rates are a lot higher using mobile phones than paper clips.”

An inspired experience

There are few things more frustrating than a sluggish upload that keeps failing when it hits 95%. This makes network infrastructure that is agile, reliable and capacious a must to an inspired time in the stands. Both Signal Iduna Park (home of Borussia Dortmund) and Amsterdam ArenA (home of AFC Ajax) have employed Huawei’s agile stadium solution.

This solution offers end-to-end support capabilities and a comprehensive implementation process that includes network planning, deployment, configuration optimization, testing and verification. The solution integrates the latest 802.11 technologies, including 802.11n, 802.11ac, MIMO, and implicit beamforming – all of which greatly improve network throughput. A smart scheduling mechanism also raises the potential access density.

Scalability is also a plus for this solution. Sander Van Stiphout emphasizes “As an operator of the stadium, we should always be ready for the future. The network should give us the ability to scale up when needed. If you look at demand for bandwidth required, there is huge demand and this will continue in the future. Scalability is very important.”

Ensuring secure browsing and mobile payment also merits consideration, as fans are very cautious of vulnerabilities in these areas. Huawei’s agile controller interoperates with security resource center to ensure security for the entire network. Security functions are not only implemented by egress firewalls. The agile controller collects security events from the entire network, performs big data analysis, and automatically delivers security policies.

Jerzy Wasowicz would add, “On the network level, we use tools from Huawei like its agile controller, to manage the content intelligently so that people are allowed to view and buy on the mobile applications in a secure online environment.”