Rogers has a lot invested in hockey this year. The company is keen to make the most of the over $5 billion dollars it spent on NHL broadcasting rights, streaming regular- and post-season game to a number of screens. Last night was the first of 1000 games to be streamed by Rogers this season, and it looks like fans are embracing GameCentre Live and the newly announced GamePlus app.
This afternoon, Rogers announced that 55,000 fans live streamed 1.9 million minutes of hockey last night. That includes 80,000 minutes of on-demand video and replays from multiple angles, and though 75% of users were streaming via the web, the remaining 25% were streaming right to their tablet or phone (13,750 Rogers customers). Rogers recently reported its wireless subscriber base topped 9.4 million.
Rogers CEO Guy Laurence said the company was ‘off to a good start,’ and mentioned that fans have been providing feedback on bugs present in the beta version of its app.
“We’re off to a good start. The app is still in beta mode, and there are some gremlins to sort out but we got some great feedback from the fans,” Laurence commented. “At one stage there were more people watching the game on mobiles in Toronto than all of the USA.”
Rogers is tackling hockey season with a combination of GameCentre Live and the GamePlus app, which offers camera angles from numerous different places, such as the referee’s helmet, the goal line, and the team benches. There’s also options for replaying different parts of the game, like penalties, power plays, and goals via MyReplay.
GameCentre Love costs $200 for the whole season, although Rogers is offering an early-bird discount until October 13th that takes the price down by $20.
Read more: The best ways to watch hockey on mobile
[source]Rogers[/source]
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