31-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Broadcast Pro
IBC reveals finalists for 2025 Innovation Awards
The winners of the IBC2025 Innovation Awards will be presented on Sunday 14 September.
IBC has revealed the finalists for the IBC2025 Innovation Awards, spotlighting collaborative projects that tackle real-world challenges and drive progress in the global media, entertainment and technology sectors. These awards are organised into five distinct categories: Content Creation, Content Distribution, Content Everywhere, Social Impact and Environment & Sustainability. Together, they showcase both technical innovation and societal contribution in a single celebration of industry achievement.
Fergal Ringrose, Chair of the 2025 Innovation Awards Jury, said: 'We are very grateful indeed to our panel of judges for their wisdom and insight in choosing our shortlists as the standard of entries, from all around the globe, was so consistently high this year. Innovation never sleeps, and this year we can clearly see an evolution away from technology lurches enforced by the COVID-19 pandemic period towards greater refinement of innovation across the electronic media content creation, distribution and consumption ecosystem, often driven by advancing AI, hybrid and cloud-enhanced workflows.'
In the Content Creation category, the finalists include MBC's collaboration with Pixtree and SK Telecom on AI-assisted video remastering for Korean broadcast content; NBC Olympics' IP-based editorial multiviewer system for gymnastics coverage at Paris 2024 developed with Avid, EVS, and NEP; and NHK Japan's 'Deep Ocean: Kingdom of the Coelacanth,' a 8K underwater documentary produced with ZDF/ARTE, OceanX, and others.
For Content Distribution, standout nominees include the global live-streaming of the Crunchyroll Anime Awards, produced with the support of Amagi, AWS, Bridge Digital, and Pixelogic; Sky Group's MediaMesh, a cloud-native broadcast transformation project in partnership with AWS, SDVI, Telestream, and TMT Insights; and Olympic Broadcasting Services' hybrid streaming delivery platform for Paris 2024, developed with Alibaba Cloud.
In the Content Everywhere category, Claro's innovative football viewing solution integrates a team-logo button on the remote control to connect users directly to live matches, with technical backing from Gracenote and Teleidea Middleware. Also recognised are the Alliance for Open Media, Intel, and Meta's SVT-AV1 encoder, which enables efficient streaming on low-spec mobile devices; and Pilipinas Live Shorts by Cignal, which uses AI from Quickplay Shorts and Twelve Labs to auto-generate and integrate user-generated content into vertical scroll feeds.
The Social Impact category highlights initiatives with tangible benefits to society, including the Media Talent Manifesto's neurodiversity mentoring programme backed by Deluxe, Molinare, and Vizrt; SOUV by SNEWS, enabling remote Amazonian communities to share news content in partnership with Rede Amazônica; the Mobile Justice app, developed with the American Civil Liberties Union and powered by Jotto, Quadrant2, and Wowza, which empowers citizens to document law enforcement interactions; and France Télévisions' pioneering use of C2PA content authentication in daily journalism, developed with Dalet.
In Environment & Sustainability, finalists include Nanlux's Evoke 5000B, a highly efficient lighting fixture that offers 75% energy savings compared to traditional tungsten lights; SK Telecom and Pixtree's energy-efficient UHD upscaling solution for IPTV, which supports 6.7 million subscribers and drastically cuts carbon emissions; and Germany's Green Film Shooting initiative, which promotes sustainable practices across the film and media industries.
The winners of the IBC2025 Innovation Awards will be announced during a live ceremony at 18:00 CEST on Sunday, 14 September, on the main stage of the IBC Conference in Amsterdam. The event will also include the presentation of the IBC International Honour for Excellence, awarded for outstanding contributions to the industry, and the Best Technical Paper, selected from peer-reviewed research shared during the IBC Conference from 12–14 September.
