Business News Holding

Tag: olympic-games

  • Viewers glued to HD Olympics coverage

    First all high definition Games proving irresistible as viewing figures climb

    NBC Universal is attracting an average of 29.1 million US viewers to its coverage of the 2008 Olympic Games, according to figures just released.

    While viewership was undoubtedly helped by the extravant opening ceremony and early coverage of US swimming star Michael Phelps, the unprecedented high def footage must take some of the credit.

    For the first time by a US broadcaster at a Summer Olympics, NBC is broadcasting the whole Olympic Games entirely in high definition.

    This will stretch to some 3,600 hours of Beijing coverage, the most ambitious single media project in history.

    The viewing results make it the most highly rated broadcast of the Summer Games held outside the United States since 1976.

    A total of 114 million viewers turned on their TVs for at least part of the broadcast in the first two days, about 20 million more than the 2004 games in Athens, NBC said, citing figures from Nielsen Media Research.

    Meanwhile, Fuji Television Network and NTT Corp are using the Games to test out “non-compressed HDTV video transmission using a wireless technology based on the 120GHz milliwave band” in live feeds from Beijing events.

    By utilising the technology, the duo say they have demonstrated “simultaneous, wireless transmission of multiple HDTV video channels without delay”.

    This enables camera-toting employees to capture footage from more places by being able to walk around untethered.

  • HDTV coverage of Beijing Olympics offers athletics action in immediate slow motion

    Belgian company I-Movix is to provide its SprintCam Live 2 HDTV cameras to cover much of the action from the Olympic games in Beijing.
    Able to record events at speeds up to 8,000 frames per second, a rate which is more than 260 times that of normal video.
    And while the cameras produce incredible slow-motion images, there is nothing slow about replay times – clips are available for immediate re-viewing.
    The HDTV cameras will be deployed with mobile units at all the major games venues.
    While sports fans have come to expect slow-motion instant replay with standard definition productions, it has not been so in high definition.
    Beijing is going to be both a proving ground and shop-window for HDTV and the I-Movix cameras are part of an array of HD hardware that will be providing unparalleled high def coverage of the sporting event.

  • No mention of Olympic factor as US market for flat-panel HDTVs remains strong despite economic down-turn

    Sales of LCD and plasma TVs showed a 53 per cent year-on-year increase in the US for the first quarter of 2008, with more than 7.5 million units sold.
    This represents a 7 per cent increase over industry projections for the period.
    While analysts in Japan have attributed a 35 per cent increase in flat-panel TV sales during the first half of June to the upcoming Beijing Olympics, industry executives in the US are being more cagey.
    But what those attending the DisplaySearch TV Supply Chain Conference in San Diego did agree on was that despite the state of the US economy, the North America TV market remains robust – so far.
    Paul Gagnon director of North American TV research at DisplaySearch, said the data also highlighted consumer preference for smaller LCD and plasma TVs.
    “Smaller TV sizes are doing better than larger sizes, while the larger sizes seem to be under pressure from weakened consumer spending,” he said.
    “For example, global shipments of 32” TVs exceeded our forecasts by 10 per cent, while all screen size categories above 40” fell short of expectations by 3 per cent or more.”
    The summer holiday season is expected to present a major challenge for US retailers if the present economic trend continues, according to a majority of conference attendees.
    That could translate into better deals for consumers, and those deals could remain even if the economy recovers over the next few years because panel manufacturers are adding more TV assembly lines.

  • Deal signed with Intelsat to provide HD transmissions from Beijing Olympic Games

    The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) has signed a multi transponder deal with Intelsat Ltd for the video carriage of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games to Europe.
    C-/Ku-band cross-strap capacity on the Intelsat 706 satellite, located at 50.2 degrees East, will be used to distribute the all high definition event to EBU members.
    Intelsat is the only global satellite operator to have provided coverage of every Olympic Games since 1968.
    The EBU, of which a large proportion of the major European broadcasters are members, provides a full range of network services, including but not limited to HD transmissions to broadband video carriage.
    Stefan Kurten, director of the Eurovision Operations Department, said: “By using Intelsat to deliver the Summer Games, we are confident that our members will benefit from the reliable service Intelsat offers when it comes to large scale events.”