PANSTADIA & ARENA MANAGEMENT WINTER 2013/14 Multimedia
changes THE
game
Maros Krajci, General Manager of HC SLOVAN Bratislava.
F
irst there were games, played by people to test strength, courage
and ability. As society developed, those who were better than the average person played games, and were dubbed athletes. It was extraordinary to watch athletes, whether at the Olympics or at a local pitch because of their prowess. Eventually games were organised into leagues and leagues organised seasons (football and rugby in the fall, hockey and basketball in the winter, baseball and cricket in the summer) and, in order for more people to enjoy watching athletes, stadiums were invented.
The fi rst stadiums were rudimentary affairs, no seats, barely a decent place to view all the action and no place to grab a snack. Fast-forward 100 years and the landscape has changed entirely. Now stadiums and arenas feature fancy sit-down restaurants, comfortable seats and incredible sightlines so all fans, no matter how far up they are sitting, can enjoy a decent view of the action.
Still, even at the beginning of the century, live action video in stadiums was missing, something that most viewers sitting at home in their living rooms were getting: instant replays, different camera angles, updates from games around the league, pretty much everything besides what was happening right in front of the fan’s eyes.
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Fast-forward another 10 years though and all that has changed again as fans can now become much more involved in the game with multimedia tools.
In 2011, in Slovakia, one of the most advanced arenas in the world opened to host the IIHF World Championships. The HC SLOVAN Bratislava Arena featured technology that was the most advanced in several directions: biometric turnstiles, the world’s fi rst high-def LED circular scoreboard, a double-sided LED advertising fascia under the roof, and a central controlling system that required only two people to operate and drive fan experience.
The arena, originally constructed in 1940 during the Second World War, had undergone some minor renovations and upgrades during communism, but nothing as extensive as the reconstruction that started in 2009 (Fischer Architects, Ingsteel – general contractor). The reconstruction was ordered because, as Maros Krajci, the General Manager of the Kontinental Hockey League Club HC SLOVAN Bratislava says: “before reconstruction the arena held 8,350 visitors including VIPs and it wasn’t generating enough revenue to be sustainable. The total cost
The infl uence of high-end technology or: how it’s more fun to go to a game now than it ever was before.
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