CISCO
UNTAPPED
POTENTIAL
The introduction of innovative technology helps
continually push the bounds of what is possible
in the sports and entertainment industry for
fans, venues and teams around the world
Re-imagining the stadium concept
Compared to 10 years ago, today’s entire concept of
a stadium has expanded to include so much more
than just four walls with tens of thousands of seats.
Increasingly, venues are being viewed as a
media platform, with a host of media delivery and
consumption opportunities for fans, as well as for
sponsors looking for new ways to engage with stadiumgoers.
Moreover, teams and venue operators are now
understanding the importance of a seamless experience
“from street to seat”, starting from the moment a fan
arrives in the parking lot, through to the retail and
dining experiences at the venue to the game itself.
In Atlanta, Georgia, a partnership between Cisco
and Major League Baseball’s Atlanta Braves resulted in
a fully re-imagined experience for fans.
Anchored by its SunTrust Park stadium, the
property also features a 1.5-million ft2 (139,000m2)
mixed-use development called The Battery Atlanta,
with bars, restaurants, retail shops, apartments, a fourstar
hotel and a live music venue. By leveraging Cisco’s
entire portfolio of solutions across video, cloud,
networking, security, and data and analytics, the Braves
have created a holistic environment for fans that is
powerful, centrally controlled and revenue-generating
365 days a year.
This is the same model for the brand-new SoFi
Stadium and Hollywood Park in Los Angeles. The
world-class sports and entertainment destination being
built by Los Angeles Rams owner/Chairman E. Stanley
Kroenke will feature office, retail and residential
spaces, and more than 20 acres of parkland, with
SoFi Stadium, the new home of the Los Angeles
Chargers and Los Angeles Rams, positioned as
the centerpiece of the development.
n 2009, AT&T Stadium (then known as
Cowboys Stadium) in Dallas, Texas, opened
to great fanfare. The mega-sized venue was
heralded as a stadium ahead of its time, which
is a theme that would continue over the coming
decade as the Dallas Cowboys and its venue operators
understood the importance of staying ahead of
industry trends and fan expectations.
One of the focal points of that innovative spirit was
the implementation of Cisco Vision – a dynamic,
video-based content delivery system that allowed the
Cowboys to connect to fans in a whole new way, while
also creating new revenue streams for the club and
providing the flexibility to adapt the stadium to support
any number of events. In pioneering a new way to
deliver dynamic content to each of the nearly 3,000
screens throughout the stadium, Cisco was key partner
in the Cowboys’ tripling their number of sponsors in
the venue after moving from static to digital signage.
In parallel, the team also focused on connectivity
and invested in Cisco Connected Stadium Wi-Fi to
bring reliable, secure, high-density Wi-Fi to fans at
all events. Innovation continued with team ownership
prioritizing stadium enhancements to meet increasing
expectations in an ever-evolving digital world.
Together, Cisco and the Dallas Cowboys tapped
into an industry that was ripe for disruption, and
understood that by developing and deploying
innovative technology solutions, they would be able
to unlock great potential.
Today, the conversation about how to install
technology at a venue has become a much more
strategic discussion as to how teams and venues
leverage these solutions to engage fans and have
a better understanding of what they are doing.
San Francisco 49ers’ Levi’s
Stadium was packed out and
fully connected for the NFL
game against the Pittsburgh
Steelers in September 2019
TECHNOLOGY
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