How often do you hear about something going terribly wrong at a concert or sporting event? Remember the Super Bowl power outage of 2013 or the exceedingly poor sound quality at a recent concert in London? It can be embarrassing—and costly—for venues when these situations occur, especially when they could have been avoided in the first place.
With the rise of live events and the boundless social media interaction of attendees at these venues, there’s been an increased need for proper technology in place to handle the endless traffic. Picture the ramifications if there’s not enough bandwidth for the thousands of attendees to communicate via Twitter (News - Alert), Instagram and Snapchat. Or imagine if hundreds of thousands of people are viewing a concert via webcast and the screen suddenly goes dark. By the time the webcast recovers, it may take several minutes for everyone to get back to the live event—while the viewers head to social media to complain about the lengthy delay. It’s humiliating for the parties involved, and their jobs are now on the line because of technical difficulties.
But what if there was a way to avoid such issues during live events? That’s where Transbeam, a national provider of broadband connectivity for events, comes into play as the company provides a full suite of event connectivity and customized branding solutions. One of the event industry’s top connectivity experts, Transbeam (News - Alert) (News - Alert) works with venue owners and event planners to customize access availability and the end-user experience for each event.
From the development of event-branded WiFi (News - Alert) splash pages to the availability of wireless Internet for all exhibitors or attendees, Transbeam delivers support for trade shows, conferences and expos in multiple metro areas across the U.S., including various venues throughout New York City. 2014 was a banner year for the company as Transbeam played a pivotal role in a number of events from the NFL Draft to the Brooklyn Half Marathon to “America’s Got Talent” to the Westminister Dog Show to the Justin Timberlake concert hosted by MasterCard (News - Alert).
“Venue managers and show managers can rest assured that their events will go smoothly when they work with us,” Transbeam’s COO Avi Nebel, who is responsible for the Events Connectivity division, told TMCnet in a recent interview. “When we come to an event, we’re bringing 15 years of event experience, 18 years of designing broadband and over 10 years of providing portal support, so we’ve developed a reputation as a dependable broadband company for events.
“Events are not like they used to be,” Nebel added. “When and if something goes wrong, it will be very visible, and companies cannot afford that negative exposure.”
For example, to prevent webcast crashes, like those mentioned above, Transbeam installs redundant circuits as failover; Transbeam has primary, backup and tertiary circuits—three levels of firewalls—to ensure “hiccups” are prevented. Some other companies may not have the resources to put in that type of infrastructure, according to Nebel.
“IT directors now need a crazy amount of bandwidth for these concerts where thousands of people are on social media and video streaming,” he said. “So these events need to have a solid WiFi solution and voice quality must be solid. Drops in broadband and WiFi can kill the event—we’ve seen that happen with some carriers.”
Moreover, Transbeam customizes solutions for every event. The more complex the job, the more it can show off its engineering know-how and flexibility to create tailor-made solutions on a client-by-client basis. For instance, company executives will determine the number of attendees and devices expected at the venue, examining whether the network will be overloaded and if frequencies need to be altered on the backend. While some vendors may offer only one solution, Transbeam has a plethora of software options to tailor to each event. Also, Transbeam employs dedicated, experienced staff members who are focused on events. These are home-grown technicians and engineers who can put in infrastructure and fix local area networks.
In addition to the events it worked on this year, Transbeam partnered with MasterCard in its new app, “Qkr!” The app allows users to pay for drinks, food and much more on their smartphone. During the app’s launch event, the app supported more than 1,000 devices and provided over 500 megabytes of bandwidth—so those in attendance could purchase merchandise, food and drinks through Qkr! Transbeam also provided an Ethernet connection to support the live social media board, displaying live tweets throughout the evening.
Looking ahead, Transbeam will be expanding its wireless solutions, in particular for its event connectivity division, launching WiMAX (News - Alert) solutions throughout New York City in 2015. If there are pop-up events around the city and the business needs a wireless solution within days, Transbeam is able to deploy its WiMAX solution quickly.
“It amazes me how the names coming to us are getting bigger and bigger each year,” Nebel said. “Through word of mouth, venues know they can trust us because we consistently provide reliable service for these events.”
Transbeam is located at West 38th Street in Manhattan, N.Y. Visit www.transbeam.com for more information or email [email protected].