2011 Rugby World Cup Brought Live to Millions of Fans via Ericsson's Voyager II

July 19, 2011

A potential 25 million rugby fans across Oceania, and many more around the world, will enjoy live high definition coverage of the 2011 Rugby World Cup from New Zealand, following the deployment of the Ericsson (NASDAQ:ERIC) Voyager II solution by Sydney Teleport Services. It will use Ericsson’s recently launched and groundbreaking Digital Satellite News Gathering (DSNG) product for the live contribution of matches during the tournament, which begins on September 9 in Auckland, from the stadia to broadcasters in New Zealand and Australia, and further afield to international audiences. Throughout the tournament, which features the sport’s biggest names, fans will be able to watch high quality coverage of every match up from a number of venues around the country until the Final on October 23, back in Auckland.

"This is the very highest level for rugby fans and the most highly anticipated event within the sport, and with such a huge following around the world, it is imperative that we can reliably provide coverage of each match in the very highest quality possible," said Scott Jenkins, Managing Director, Sydney Teleport Services. "A critically important event requires critically selected solutions, and having worked with the Ericsson team in the past, we were confident that it could provide us with the reliability we required for this important project. We have been impressed by the sheer quality and flexibility that the new Voyager II solution provides, and as a result are pleased to be able to provide broadcasters with the excellent standard of coverage that rugby fans will demand."

Ericsson's Voyager II is a radical new concept from the company that invented the modern DSNG solution over 15 years ago and is the first to harness the power of MPEG-4 AVC 4:2:2 encoding with 10-bit precision. It also features a fully functional front panel that provides users with maximum control. Based on industry feedback, it introduces a bottom-up re-engineered hardware and menu structure, allowing fast access to the most common SNG operations, easy monitoring of incoming audio and video signals and operator customization.

"Live news and sports gathering is constantly becoming a more important part of broadcasters’ offering, as viewers continue to demand high quality live event coverage to match the standard they are used to from other content," said Staffan Pehrson, Vice President and Head of Solution Area TV, Ericsson. "With live events, reliability is paramount – it is all about bringing viewers closer to the action. Having pioneered DSNG technology, we at Ericsson are proud to be taking this to the next level with Voyager II and are pleased to enable coverage of the Rugby World Cup for broadcasters across the globe."