University of Oklahoma Adds LiveU XTender Antenna
Story Highlights
Following its successful first year of leveraging LiveU technology for live cellular-based video transmission, University of Oklahoma (OU) announced that it will add to its tool kit one of LiveU’s latest developments, the LU-Xtender external antenna, which significantly increases cellular bandwidth and range in highly congested and remote venues. LiveU backpack solutions are currently deployed with a variety of NFL, MLB, NBA, and NHL franchises and groups, as well as various colleges and conferences across the U.S.
OU operates 21 different sports programs and produces over 1,500 hours of programming per school year. The content is aired on local TV, sports cable networks like ESPN and Fox Sports, and on the university’s online properties, branded as SoonerVision and soonersports.com.
Since 2012, OU has been leveraging LiveU’s LU70 backpacks to transmit games, competitions, pressers, interviews, and more, from venues that lack uplink connectivity, such as track and field, gymnastics, crew, and more. The department has also utilized LiveU to produce some of its sports news and commentary programming from different locations, for example from restaurants and other places, rather than in-studio shows, without the need for satellite trucks or hardwired connections.
“LiveU has enabled us to easily and reliably go live from places we couldn’t have in the past, and allowed us to provide live coverage for the first time of many sports, in a way that seamlessly integrates with our existing video partners and workflows,” said Brandon Meier, OU. “We look forward to even better performance from highly congested or remote venues with the new Xtender external antenna.”
According to Tim Prukop, Head of Sports and New Media at LiveU, “OU is one of the pioneering programs in the college world today when it comes to live video. They have been quick to embrace LiveU technology to enhance their video coverage, and we’re very happy to see that they are getting results that not only get them to continue to use our technology, but also to deploy additional LiveU products.”