NBA commissioner Adam Silver spoke Thursday before Game 1 of the NBA Finals from Oracle Arena, which is home to one of the most tech-minded teams in the Golden State Warriors.
The league knows the area well, given its many partnerships with leading tech companies that have their headquarters nearby in Silicon Valley.
“I think the happenstance of having one of your top teams playing in this community of course generates even more interest, but I also look at those companies long-term as potential distributors of live game broadcasting,” Silver told reporters. “Right now of course our games are largely distributed certainly in the United States through traditional media companies. Not so much outside the United States, incidentally. There we’re in business with more so-called over-the-top providers and other social media platforms.
“But we have done lots of experiments whether it be with Facebook, with Twitter, with YouTube, with Instagram, with other great technology companies, and my sense is over time those companies are increasingly going to look to premium live sports as a way of differentiating themselves from their competitors, so we continue to cultivate those relationships.”
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With startups, Silver indicated the league listens to inbound pitches and has senior vice president of digital media Melissa Rosenthal Brenner meet with smaller companies. The ones that the NBA discover to be “interesting” will have their ideas brought to Silver and deputy commissioner Mark Tatum.
Startups such as Israel-based video company WSC Technologies and Pittsburgh-based mobile app developer YinzCam are among those that have struck deals with Brenner.
“We have encouraged a lot of those companies to experiment with our content, not so much our live games, but certainly we cultivated…a very large global social media community,” Silver said. “We have encouraged those companies to work with our content, to find new ways to connect their users directly into the NBA, whether it’s through our players, whether it’s through our teams or through the league office, and we think that’s been very successful. And I think that’s part of why the league has been so popular. Especially over the last decade. I think it’s really by embracing the tech community and social media.”