Civolution s SyncNow Syncs Showpal, Ireland s premier companion screen app for broadcast viewing developed by Axonista and TV

Civolution's SyncNow Syncs Showpal, Ireland's premier companion screen app for broadcast viewing developed by Axonista and TV3 28 Oct 2013

Axonista, an award-winning provider of social TV and 2nd screen technology and Civolution, the leading provider of technology and solutions for identifying, managing and monetizing content, announce the launch of ShowPal , an app developed with TV3, Ireland's largest commercial television broadcaster. The app provides TV3 viewers with a single route to second screen interactivity for a wide variety of TV3's programmes.

Axonista collaborated with TV3 to develop ShowPal, Ireland's first broadcaster branded TV viewing companion app. They called on Civolution's Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) technology SyncNow in order to synchronize the app with TV3's broadcast. To enhance the TV viewing experience, the app delivers a mix of content and social media interaction related to the channel's programmes and allows viewers to interact with shows by taking part in quizzes, games, voting and polls.

Stephen Grant, TV3 Group Director of Online, and Head of ShowPal, said As a broadcaster, TV3 recognises that second-screening is a mainstream activity and we sought to develop an app that would deliver relevant, engaging and entertaining content to the second screen synchronous with what is happening on the TV screen. Using Civolution's Audio Watermarking technology enabled Axonista, our development partners in ShowPal, to power this element of the app. This has worked brilliantly to allow us deliver this additional content to the app synched perfectly to broadcast.

ShowPal is built on Axonista's Ediflo platform, which enables broadcasters such as ESPN, MTV, SPI, Setanta Sports and TV3 to create and launch their own branded second screen apps for Roku, Xbox, web and mobile platforms, including iOS, Android and Windows.

Claire McHugh, CEO and Co-founder of Axonista said: Broadcasters are looking for ways to bring viewers into a branded experience that really adds value and strengthens the relationship between the broadcaster and the audience. Our collaboration with TV3 on ShowPal demonstrates how broadcasters can use our Ediflo CMS to build compelling viewer-centric companion apps to meet those goals.

Irish viewers watch more than 25 hours of TV every week, about 8 minutes more TV per day today than they did in 2010 and up 70% of tablet owners and 68% of smartphone owners use their devices while watching TV.

ShowPal and Ediflo make use of Civolution's SyncNow Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) solution, leveraging Civolution's live Axon-based embedding solution at their head-end, to sync the content between linear and non-linear TV viewing and the companion app. It ensures that the app delivers contextual real-time gaming, advertising and social content to viewers even with live-produced content and TV programming drifts.

Producing a single app portal that is a route to second screen apps across its entire content offering can simplify second screen interactivity for the viewer and drives up app usage and channel loyalty, says Alex Terpstra, CEO, Civolution. Seeing our SyncNow ACR technology integrated with Axonista's Ediflo platform ensures real-time synchronization of the content between the main and second screens. We're proud to help TV3 create an app that supports Ireland's TV viewers discover and share experiences linked to its programming.

Civolution's SyncNow has already been widely deployed on a global scale including many of the leading European broadcasters and enables real-time identification and second-accurate synchronization between broadcast, on-demand or recorded content and interactive applications on companion devices - tablets, smartphones and laptops - to present compelling synchronized interactive user experiences. Civolution's SyncNow powers a range of second screen consumer applications for movie and show producers, broadcasters, second screen platform providers and advertisers worldwide.

ShowPal is already available on iOS devices and will be available on Android in spring 2014. The app hit the top of the Apple App Store charts within 24 hours of launch. Further developments include allowing viewers to learn more about and buy products they have seen on particular shows.

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