UniqFEED is to step up its negotiations with Bundesliga clubs after receiving league-wide approval for its AI-powered virtual advertising technology following recent tests.
The rubber stamping from the German Football League (DFL) and its Sportcast host broadcast subsidiary allows UniqFEED to provide its services for the virtual replacement of pitchside LED boards and insertion or overlay of goal-side ‘cam carpets’ within live broadcasts.
The news represents a key development in football for UniqFEED since it announced two years ago that it had refined its ‘AdApt’ software-based virtual advertising product for use in the sport. Until then, the Switzerland-based company had largely focused on tennis and winter sports.
UniqFEED is now keen to close deals with Bundesliga clubs or their appointed agency as it looks to eat into a space in which Supponor, the TGI Sport-owned rival, is particularly established.
Tom Huston, chief commercial officer at UniqFEED, told SportBusiness: “We are actively engaged with both the Bundesliga clubs and the sports marketing agencies that represent them. Formal approval is a pre-requisite to working within the Bundesliga, so now that we have achieved that we are well-placed to follow up and expect to have deals in place well in advance of the start of the new season.”
Huston, who joined at the start of 2023, described UniqFEED as “at the beginning” of its journey with the Bundesliga in terms of “building new relationships to provide clubs with improved commercial returns through virtual advertising”.
Tests delivered from Sportcast’s broadcast and production centre in Cologne covered matches held at Augsburg’s WWK Arena, Borussia Dortmund’s Signal Iduna Park, Borussia Mönchengladbach’s Borussia Park, Stuttgart’s MHP Arena, VfL Wolfsburg’s Volkswagen Arena and Werder Bremen’s Weserstadion.
The UniqFEED technology was evaluated on its image quality, reliability, technical integration and performance in a fully remote, live production environment. The AdApt software offers the shortest calibration time of all suppliers, according to UniqFEED.
Supponor, the only other software-based solutions provider with Bundesliga approval, was granted its backing from the DFL and Sportcast in April 2022. Its hardware-based virtual advertising solution had already been approved for use by the clubs.
Supponor has typically signed deals with Sportfive for the agency to sell virtual advertising packages based on its solution on behalf of various German football clubs. In October last year, Supponor extended its agreement with Wolfsburg for the use of its Air platform to continue to enhance the club’s advertising capabilities, including, for the first time, second row placements at the Volkswagen Arena.
Dominik Scholler, the DFL’s vice-president of product management and innovation, said that, with the league-wide approval of the UniqFEED system, Bundesliga clubs “now have access to another powerful, software-based technology for virtual perimeter advertising”.
Roger Hall, UniqFEED’s chief executive, added: “With a proven track record across multiple football leagues, Major League Baseball, and international tennis and golf tournaments, our solutions are trusted by some of the most demanding rights holders in live sports.”
UniqFEED secured the first football-specific deployment for AdApt during the 2023-24 ÖFB Cup game between Grazer AK and SK Sturm Graz.
Read more: UniqFEED adds competition to football’s virtual advertising space