Greyhound racing is to return to Sky Sports next month after SIS agreed to use its outside broadcast units to transmit meetings from BAGS (Bookmakers’ Afternoon Greyhound Service) tracks. Sky’s decision to pull the plug on greyhound racing in December, as part of cost-cutting measures, was greeted with dismay by the greyhound fraternity who saw the coverage as a valuable platform for the sport. But SIS agreed to step in as part of an alternative plan, involving fewer fixtures from higher profile courses. Under the deal, SIS will stream all the races live to betting shops, and also to Sky Sports where coverage will be broadcast live as part of a new-look greyhound racing show. George Irvine, Managing Director, SIS Betting (pictured), said: “Having been involved in initially bringing horseracing to Sky in 1995 through the Winning Post, a show which later evolved into At The Races, I’m particularly proud to be doing the same for greyhound racing.” SIS, which comprises of SIS Betting and outside broadcast supplier SIS Live and is a subsidiary of Satellite Information Services, has an expanding racing business. Through SIS Live it provides OB facilities to feed on-site screens at Arena Leisure’s seven UK racecourses – a deal in place until 2016. It delivers the same coverage to Sky’s horse racing channel At The Races as well as to SIS’ bookmakers services. It is also used by GBI Racing, a joint venture company of RMG (Racecourse Media Group). All in, that means SIS Live provides uplinking and OBs at 800 race meets and over 5,000 individual races a year, which is one reason why the company is focussing R&D in deploying IP for video distribution on site and for remoting gallery operations away from site. “Where you have a high volume of events per day then there’s potential for integrating their production into a centralised gallery controlled from a single location,” says SIS Live Commercial Director Phil Aspden. SIS Betting also streams live thoroughbred horse racing from Latin America and Dubai, and greyhound racing from Racing Post TV and the sport’s Premier League. From mid-2013, SIS will also exclusively stream greyhound racing from Britain’s newest track, Towcester. Data is also a key part of the offer: the SISdata365 feed offers a comprehensive horse and greyhound racing service from meetings in the UK, Ireland and the rest of the world. www.sis.tvwww.sislive.tv Adrian Pennington
