All broadcasters who own rights to the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in 2012 visited Helsinki and Stockholm on October 18-19. During the site visit, all areas related to broadcasting where looked at into in detail.

When the 2012 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship starts in May, preparations for the event will have been ongoing for over three years. For television companies to broadcast the event successfully, it’s all about planning.

As the radio and TV companies visited Helsinki and Stockholm, their representatives, about 40 people in total, saw and experienced the hosting arenas in real life and also got an opportunity to ask questions from the local organizing committee.

What then do the broadcasters need to know beforehand?

TV-camera positions are of course one of the most important things, as well as the set-up of the mixed zone and commentator areas. There will be several studios on site and therefore all possible locations where looked into. Broadcaster offices and trucks will be placed at the TV compound, located next to the arenas in both venues.

Host Broadcaster for the whole event is Mediatec, whose responsibility is the produce and distribute the international TV signal for all the right holding broadcasters.

All issues related to TV and radio rights are handled by Infront Sports & Media AG. In Finland, MTV3 is the owner of the broadcasting rights, whereas in Sweden, TV4 has the rights to the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship.

During the last IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in 2011, the event was broadcast in 114 countries and territories. The agreements with more than 70 broadcasters accumulated to over 3,000 broadcast hours. Spectator levels were significantly raised from 2010, by around 100 million, thus taking the total cumulative audience to an all-time high of over 800 million. These numbers make the IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship one of the most watched annual sports events in the world.