beIN teams up with Synamedia

beIN Media Group distributes and produces entertainment, live sport and major international events across 5 continents, 40 countries and in 9 different languages spanning Europe, North America, Asia, Australasia and the Middle East & North Africa (MENA). beIN Media Group’s flagship sports network, beIN Sports boasts the single largest portfolio of sports rights of any global broadcaster.

With beIN TV services, subscribers can watch exclusive sports matches and events, including the UEFA Champions League, English Premier League and La Liga; they can also access extensive movie and TV series catalogues, as well as a plethora of exclusive premium channels.

beIN chose Synamedia to redesign the user interface (UI) and enrich the user experience (UX) on its various platforms – beIN TV and beIN TV VIP hybrid DTH and IP 4K Kaon set-top boxes – in time for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022. The new experience runs on Synamedia’s Infinite cloud TV and it is protected by Synamedia’s security solutions and services. As part of the project, Synamedia also deployed a new headend.

In a broadcast TV world first, one of the new features available to the global sports and entertainment broadcaster will allow sports fans to watch two live matches simultaneously on a single screen.

As well as watching live matches in parallel, the new features also include restart-TV to pause and resume live content, recording up to four programmes while watching a fifth, and direct access to YouTube – with integration of other third party streaming apps planned. The UX supports Arabic, English, French and Spanish languages.

“With all eyes on beIN as the official broadcaster of the World Cup in Qatar, we needed a technology partner who could deliver a future-proofed platform with stand-out features to captivate viewers during the tournament and then evolve with more innovation over the long term,” said Saleem Shah, beIN STB technology manager MENA.

“Our long-standing partner Synamedia proved to be head and shoulders above the competition, delivering the wow factor we wanted within a tight time-frame and on budget. Importantly, we now have the platform to launch several other unique breakthrough features in the coming months.” Rapid TV News