EMERYVILLE, Calif. ---CBS Mobile and MobiTV, won the Global College Sports award for the CBS Sports NCAA March Madness On Demand application for iPhone. The award was presented recently by the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS) and the Sports Video Group (SVG) at the inaugural College Sports Video Summit in Atlanta.
LINK TO WINNING 1MIN. VIDEO: http://www.mobitv.com/videos/MobiTV_MarchMadness.mov
The Global Media Awards for College Sports encompassed 10 categories in three areas of competition: Collegiate, for College Sports programming departments; Corporate, for media companies that produce college sports video content; and Technology, for companies that develop systems for use in video production.
Streaming live all 63 games from the first round to the national championship game of the 2009 NCAA Men's College Basketball tournament on the iPhone and iPod Touch, the CBS Sports March Madness On Demand (MMOD) application powered by MobiTV beat out competition in the Technology category based on innovation, creativity and efficacy for improving fan's enjoyment of a sporting event.
"CBS Mobile is pleased to be recognized for the March Madness application." Said Jeff Sellinger, EVP, GM CBS Mobile. " Mobile platforms continue to evolve quickly allowing for rich content experiences that we've never seen on a phone before.”
MobiTV assisted CBS Mobile by developing the technology for users to not only watch games but also view real-time stats, video highlights, player stats, edge match-ups and more, all while keeping track of their brackets with an interactive user interface. With the devices' touch screen the MMOD application's interactive bracket, wide screen viewing and numerous additional interactive features were made possible.
"MobiTV and CBS Mobile are proud of the breakthrough consumer experience this application delivered,” said Charlie Nooney, Chairman and CEO, MobiTV. "This is an exciting time for the mobile entertainment industry, and MobiTV's passion for creating next-generation applications for sports enthusiasts and all mobile users puts us in the center of the fun.”
The baseline of iPhone's OS technologies provided the foundation CBS Mobile and MobiTV needed to deliver a first-of-its-kind mobile video experience, using Darwin streaming servers to deliver live video; Webkit to display .html within the application; and core graphics and animation to enable a deeper integrated experience.
Within the first week of the applications release, this experience, priced at $4.99, became the highest paid application in Apple's iTunes App Store. CBS Mobile has also released apps for TV.com, CBS Sports and LastFM. CBS Sports was the #1 free Sports Application and TV.com reached #2 for Free Applications overall. In the past year, MobiTV has also been honored for the Best Mobile TV Service at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, and was named a Silicon Valley Technology Fast 50 Company.
