Telco
France Telecom, through its Orange and GlobeCast business units, will
once again supply a range of telecommunications service for the Tour de
France cycling epic, which starts in Monaco this Saturday, July 4.
Orange
will deploy fiber-optic cable along the entire race route, providing
bandwidth of 155 megabits per second in both finish zones, and will
also supply an enterprise-class Wi-Fi network to support the press and
all other professionals working on the Tour. Orange will also give
consumers the full Tour experience through exclusive high-quality
content across its TV, PC and mobile platforms.
Orange
will roll out 155 Mbps fiber links across the whole route and its
international points of presence (PoPs), quadrupling its bandwidth
between the interview truck and the press room and offering a
HD-quality videoconferencing system. Five Wi-Fi networks will support
Tour organizers, press, photographers and broadcasters, with a radio
terminal/server combination capable of routing more than 500
simultaneous connections. Around the press room, mobile relays will
also handle 3G and 3G+ traffic.
Broadcast
transmission vendor GlobeCast will deliver live images of the Tour de
France on behalf of rights-holders France Télévisions and Union
Européenne de Radiodiffusion. At the finish line of each stage,
GlobeCast will deploy six mobile satellite and terrestrial transmission
stations along with a coordinating reception truck, creating a system
capable of broadcasting up to 25 SD/HD video signals simultaneously.
The
Orange Sport Info network will air daily news flashes and features on
the Tour, while Orange's TV and PC platforms will provide on-demand
documentaries about legendary Tour riders. Orange's Web portal, orange.fr,
will supply near-live race highlights, video summaries of each stage,
and a daily stage review; similar content will also be offered on the
"Orange World" mobile portal.
