The Infront Sports & Media agency has said the International Ice Hockey Federation’s 2015 World Championship will be broadcast in close to 160 territories and is expected to surpass the audience figures for last year’s event.
The 2015 IIHF World Championship is being hosted in the Czech cities of Prague and Ostrava. It gets underway today (Friday) and runs through to May 17.
Infront, the event’s exclusive media and marketing partner, said new broadcast agreements this year will expand media coverage to countries such as Italy (state broadcaster Rai), the Netherlands (pay-television broadcaster Fox Sports), Brunei and Malaysia (pay-television broadcaster Astro) and Chinese Taipei (pay-television broadcaster Sportcast).
Public-service broadcaster Czech TV is covering the Championship in the host nation. Infront said the 2014 Championship in Belarus achieved a cumulative television audience of 945 million, and 2015 numbers are expected to exceed this mark.
Adding visibility in territories where no or conflicting media rights agreements are in place, Infront will again offer a live video streaming service on the IIHF’s official YouTube channel. This offering will be complemented by highlight clips available across various official IIHF social media platforms.
The 2015 Championships commence at 4:15pm GMT as Canada takes on Latvia, while the United States face Finland.