BitFire and Appear are joining forces to offer broadcasters, sports leagues, and streaming platforms a faster, more flexible, and more reliable way to deliver live video from venue to viewer.
The collaboration integrates Appear’s high-density live contribution X-Platform with BitFire’s global transport network and cloud production ecosystem.
Appear’s compression functions and transport endpoints can now be paired with BitFire Engines, enabling direct ingest into BitFire’s Transport Network. Users will also gain access to BitFire’s virtual production tools, including Cloud Switcher, Cloud Replay, and FireBridge remote talent interface, to support remote control, monitoring, and distribution from anywhere, said the companies.
The combined solution is designed for live sports and entertainment broadcasts, where near-instant transport and flawless quality are critical, added the partners.
“This partnership merges best-in-class edge encoding with professional IP transport and scalable cloud production,” said Jim Akimchuk, President and CEO at BitFire. “By combining Appear’s efficient encoding with BitFire’s flexible infrastructure, we’re removing traditional geographic and hardware constraints for all live content producers.”
“Partnering with BitFire allows us to better serve the evolving needs of broadcasters and cloud operators by directly connecting our products with a world-class IP transport and cloud production provider,” said Andy Rayner, CTO at Appear. “Whether for global sporting events or full-time distribution, we’re collectively raising the bar for efficiency and quality in live production.”
