Unveiled: Candidates for IBC Innovation Prizes Announced
Registration for the International Broadcasting Convention (IBC) 2025 is now open, inviting media professionals, technology enthusiasts, and industry leaders to join the event in Amsterdam. This year's conference promises to showcase the latest innovations and collaborative projects that are shaping the future of media, entertainment, and technology.
Refining Innovation Across the Board
The IBC Innovation Awards, a key highlight of the event, is celebrating projects that are addressing real-world challenges and advancing both technical excellence and social progress. According to Fergal Ringrose, the awards' jury chair, innovation is evolving away from the rapid tech adaptations enforced by the Covid-19 pandemic period towards greater refinement of innovation across the electronic media content creation, distribution, and consumption ecosystem.
Highlights in the Content Creation Category
In the Content Creation category, some of the finalists include MBC, Pixtree, and SK Telecom for an AI-assisted video remastering system. This groundbreaking project commercializes a generalized AI-based remastering workflow for Korean broadcast content.
NBC Olympics is also a finalist for their IP-based multiviewer editorial workflow, which supported Paris 2024 gymnastics coverage by managing over 60 live sources with a mosaic-based editorial approach.
Another noteworthy finalist is "Deep Ocean: Kingdom of the Coelacanth," an 8K, 22.2 sound underwater documentary by NHK Japan alongside ZDF/ARTE, OceanX, and others, featuring the world’s first group video footage of coelacanths.
Energy-Efficient Solutions and Sustainability
Evoke 5000B film and TV lighting by Nanlux is another standout innovation, reducing energy use by approximately 75%, with battery support and a focus on sustainability. Additionally, Energy-Efficient UHD Upscaling with NPU Acceleration for Sustainable IPTV Service, developed by SK Telecom and Pixtree, achieves an 80% energy reduction and prevents 3,728 tons CO2eq emissions annually.
Collaborative Projects and Partnerships
Many of the finalists represent collaborative projects between various organisations. For instance, Sky's MediaMesh is a software-defined, broadcast operations transformation, integrated with broadcasters across Europe, partnering with AWS, SDVI, Telestream, and TMT Insights.
Claro tv+ and Omni Devices have teamed up to unify football passion with a remote control featuring team crests, technical support from Gracenote and Teleidea Middleware.
In the Content Distribution category, NBC Olympics is a finalist for their IP-based multiviewer editorial workflow for Paris 2024 gymnastics coverage.
The awards span five categories: content creation, content distribution, content everywhere, social impact, and environment and sustainability. The winners will be announced on 14 September 2025 at IBC Conference’s main stage in Amsterdam.
[1] [2] [3] - Sources for this article can be found in the references section.
Data-and-cloud-computing solutions are touted as essential in many of the innovative projects, showcased in the Content Creation category, such as the AI-assisted video remastering system by MBC, Pixtree, and SK Telecom. This system utilizes cloud computing to power its generalized AI-based remastering workflow.
Artificial intelligence, paired with technology advancements, is central to various collaborative projects, like Sky's MediaMesh, a software-defined broadcast operations transformation that integrates with broadcasters across Europe, relying on technology partners like AWS, SDVI, Telestream, and TMT Insights.
