Optimizing operations and fan experience across 8 different stadiums simultaneously within a single city.
Instant Connect and Cisco teamed up to help Qatar’s Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy manage stadium operations for the 2022 FIFA World Cup leveraging the latest technology.
From transportation to security to concessions, the logistics of managing operations for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar was daunting, requiring precise planning and powerful technology to ensure a seamless experience for all attendees. Instant Connect and Cisco were ready to help.
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A great spectator experience backed by excellent customer service. A combination of superior IT infrastructure, a great communications strategy for Qatar's frontline staff and volunteers, and extra help from Instant Connect push-to-talk software!
When Qatar won the bid for the 2022 FIFA World Cup soccer tournament, the country’s event and IT teams knew they were facing a unique set of challenges. No other sports event had ever been staged for so many teams, and so many attendees, across so many stadiums—all in one city, Doha.
The stakes were high. About a million people were coming to Qatar to watch these games and have the experience of their lives.
Qatar’s Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy – the organization responsible for delivering the infrastructure required to host the FIFA World Cup – needed to make sure they had an integrated, centralized command-and-control system to efficiently manage operations, fan experience, and event response across multiple soccer venues simultaneously.
The Supreme Committee had to choose the right partners to deliver on their vision. Instant Connect and Cisco were two of them. Cisco’s state-of-the-art network infrastructure with Instant Connect push-to-talk played an important role in the success of the event. Everything was deployed through the Cisco Advanced Services team and Mannai, a Cisco VAR based in Qatar.
The vision of Qatar’s Supreme Committee was to create a single unified technology platform across all 8 stadiums and to use that platform as a single pane of glass for all vital activities across all venues. This included facility management, fan experience, health and safety, security, and IT operations.
The goal? Instant visibility into and management of any potential incident or event, all achievable within the Central Command Center.
To execute this, the Supreme Committee needed a unified collaboration platform so they could identify and resolve venue-based events in real-time while communicating progress to management. This is where the Instant Connect push-to-talk voice platform came in, powered by Cisco’s comprehensive network infrastructure. It added a unified voice push-to-talk component to Qatar’s unified technology platform.
This was a new concept – instead of 8 disparate regional command centers supporting 8 different stadiums, Qatar’s Supreme Committee created one, with the required resiliency, failover, and communications built in.
Video interview with Qatar 2022 World Cup Tournament Executive
“The combination of Instant Connect push-to-talk running over Cisco’s IP network empowered Qatar’s operational team with real-time voice which they could deploy, as desired, to quickly respond to what was happening everywhere,” explains Mark Barlow, Instant Connect Managing Director, EMEA.
“Instant Connect’s IP-based push-to-talk was there to help frontline teams at stadiums respond to events like a lost child, medical emergency, or security breach in an unauthorized area. The voice platform was also available to help Qatar respond to possible macro incidents if they were to occur – such as traffic events or severe weather that could impact multiple stadiums hosting multiple games at the same time on the same day.”
Instant Connect is designed to turn information into action, providing an interoperable incident response system linking frontline teams in dynamic talk channels supporting mission-critical voice and data communications.
Everyone who needs to be, is connected and can communicate regardless of device, all centrally managed from Instant Connect.
Explains Mr. Barlow, “Instant Connect can link subscribers in flexible voice channels using virtually any device they prefer or are required to use – radios, smartphones, desktop computers, IP desk phones, mobile computing devices, and more. It turns every device into an IP-based push-to-talk device, empowering diverse frontline teams to instantly connect and respond to a security alert, crowd issue, or other incident.
Staff using radios can talk with volunteers on smartphones and managers on IP phones, computers, or other IP-connected devices. It’s about the speed and efficiency of a coordinated response linking all required members of a team.”
Instant Connect can automatically create talk channels in response to fan events, security threats, and IoT triggers or alarms.
To enable this rapid response capability, Qatar’s Central Command Center was responsible for designating the workflows, escalation protocols, and IoT system alerts that Qatar felt were required. These events might include:
Based on the incident or trigger, Instant Connect APIs were made available to spin up talk groups and launch frontline teams into action. The system was made available, via these APIs, to the Johnson Controls building and security environment, so that an event could be escalated within the Central Command Center.
– Video interview with Qatar 2022 World Cup Tournament Executive
The 2022 World Cup concluded with high praise worldwide, with Qatar being recognized for its stadium operations, fan experience, and thrilling soccer action. The country is proud of the new analysis and communications protocols it created. Qatar believes its unified strategy and on-the-field execution have set a new standard in how similar large-scale, multi-venue sporting events in the future can be managed.
Give your next sports or event management challenge a boost with interoperable IP-based push-to-talk from Instant Connect. Get in touch or download our eBook for more about our best-in-class solution.