Two of the most prominent and most significant technology and sports organizations in the world made their cooperation public. Microsoft teams up with the NBA to bring a new direct-to-consumer platform for their fans. Microsoft will provide all of the technical support that the NBA needs in the upcoming years.
It will be powered by Microsoft Azure. This multiyear deal sees Microsoft as an official AI, cloud, and laptop provider for the NBA. “This partnership with Microsoft will help us redefine the way our fans experience NBA basketball,” said Adam Silver, NBA commissioner.
When will this deal start?
The season is still on pause, but we can see they are adding valuable alliances for the continuation of the games. Both organizations will work together to make a tech platform for the next season. It is said that these platforms will help with their historical video archives and data collecting for future machine learning and data analyses.
As per Microsoft they “will become the Official Artificial Intelligence Partner and an Official Cloud and Laptop Partner for the NBA, Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), NBA G League, and USA Basketball beginning with the 2020-21 NBA season”.
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Microsoft will have their participation in all of the future events, like their NBA All-Star Game. These kinds of events are trendy and watched, so we can see that both organizations benefit from this, but maybe the most important thing is that fans will have more personalized content for the audience.
It is interesting to see how organizations are making more use of artificial intelligence and machine learning in many verticals and it will augment not only the trainers and the athletes, but can even be leveraged as a tool for to improve the audience experience.
Photo credit: The feature image has been provided by Microsoft as part of a press release.
Source: Microsoft press release
