In the lead up to the 2018 European Championships – a new multisport event taking place 02-12 August – Eurovision Media Services (EMS) has launched an exciting new video platform to allow broadcast partners and rightsholders to download and share broadcast quality video content related to this event.

The 2018 European Championships channel is now available as part of the existing Eurovision Sport Highway – a video library built specifically for rightsholders of different disciplines in the EBU Sports portfolio, such as the International Biathlon Union (IBU), the International Skating Union (ISU) or the European Aquatics Championships (LEN).

Media organisations will be able to remotely search, preview, select and use all of the content produced around the event to enhance their coverage. By default, multiple versions of the content will be available (e.g. broadcast quality, high web quality [10 Mbps], standard web quality [1 Mbps]) to allow users to download different quality versions for each of their channels.

As the Host Broadcaster for this event, EMS will use this platform to centralise and distribute content during the event. "Rightsholders can expect to find content produced during the competition as well as slow motion footage, interviews, and more in one single library," said Franck Choquard, Head of Products & Marketing, Eurovision Media Services.

"New functionalities are always being implemented to the platform based on the feedback we get from our clients. For instance, some of the new features we will add before the event include: a multi-facetted search to allow editors to look for footage of a particular athlete or sport and improved navigation options. We will also integrate the platform with our content enrichment and distribution ecosystem to offer editing, near-live publication, post-production distribution, and more services," he continued.

Stefan Kürten, EBU Director of Sport said "New services such as the European Championships Channel on the Eurovision Sports Highway are an important part of our rightsholder offering, enabling broadcasters to maximise their coverage of the Championships both before and during the competition. This is just one of a host of new services that will be offered for the upcoming inaugural event."

The EBU and EMS will act as both the broadcast partner (representing European public service media) and the Host Broadcaster (overseeing the overall production of the event). EMS will also distribute the event to media organisations for TV and online platforms.