Exclusive: Peacock debuts mobile multiview for Olympics on Super Bowl Sunday
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A mockup of Peacock's mobile multiview for the Winter Olympics. Photo: NBCUniversal/Peacock
Peacock will introduce major upgrades on Feb. 8, the same day NBCUniversal will broadcast both the Super Bowl and Winter Olympics, executives exclusively tell Axios.
Why it matters: The effort underscores NBCUniversal's ambitious streaming strategy as it looks to capitalize on live sports viewing during what it's calling "Legendary February," the convergence of three tentpole events.
Driving the news: Peacock's new features are designed to make live sports viewing more immersive and mobile-friendly.
- Mobile multiview: Olympics viewers can watch multiple live events at once with a four-box vertical view available in beta on iPhones or iPads. NBC Sports producers will curate the multiview, which is also available on TVs. It will include event-specific views such as Curling Multiview.
- 4K HDR coverage: This year is the first time NBCUniversal has made the Super Bowl and the Olympics' full-day coverage in all markets available in 4K HDR on NBC and Peacock. Coverage starts at 7 a.m. ET on Feb. 8 when it will deliver 17 consecutive hours of live programming.
- Social sharing: Peacock users can share live moments directly from the app via text. Available content includes Olympic highlight clips and their trivia and prediction game results.
The big picture: "Legendary February" amounts to a 17-day stretch featuring the Olympics, the Super Bowl and NBA All-Star. The lineup will test NBCUniversal's livestreaming infrastructure with dozens of simultaneous events.
- "You're scaling with volume with the Super Bowl. You're scaling with events with the Olympics ... and then you combine that with quality," Jim Denney, chief product officer, global streaming and NBCUniversal Media Group, tells Axios. "You need reliability."
- Peacock's live control system, known internally as The Dial, allows it to more quickly scale up capacity. The effort also requires tight coordination between Peacock's product team and NBC Sports' production team.
- "Many years ago, when I was at Hulu, it took a year to get ready for the Super Bowl," Denney says. "We've taken what was many months and made it a few months. We are starting to treat volume as a daily thing."
Follow the money: NBCUniversal is poised for a massive financial win.
- The company said last fall this NFL season was its highest grossing to date and that it already sold out Super Bowl ad inventory. It later said it sold out Olympics ad inventory, also setting a sales record.
Catch up quick: The network has invested in other coverage improvements for broadcast and streaming.
- For the Olympics, it will expand coverage with live drones, AI-translated team radios and Rinkside Live. For the Super Bowl, it will introduce new graphics and weather applied metrics. For NBA All-Star, it will add new camera angles, including Courtside Live, and super-slo-mo.
- "Digital distribution gives more control to the user and [we're] putting that control into their hands," Denney says.
The bottom line: "A lot of the work is just to make sure that there are no issues," Denney says. "What I want [viewers] to be able to talk about is the experience. Do we capture the audio? Does the picture look great? Is it easy to find what you're looking for?"
