NESN has a new partner to bring fans access to Boston Red Sox and Boston Bruins games.
The New England Sports Network will work with Akamai Technologies Inc., a Cambridge-based internet giant, to livestream all 2022 and 2023 Bruins home games and future Red Sox home games in 4K/HDR through the NESN 360 app.
A spokesperson said the NESN 360 app launched after the 2021-22 Bruins season, so this will be the first season Bruins games are available on the app. Red Sox games started to be available on NESN’s app this June. In April, Red Sox games will return to NESN 360, this time in 4K/HDR, thanks to this new partnership with Akamai.
NESN said Akamai’s streaming capabilities will provide the needed scale and reach to deliver the higher-bandwidth, 4K/HDR video to viewers over the internet.
“Akamai has been a crucial partner in providing the streaming infrastructure that we need to deliver 4K/HDR. The NESN team broke new ground, testing around the clock, to produce and package live home games in native 4K/HDR. Akamai media delivery solutions helped get it all into viewers homes as fast as possible,” said Kenny Elcock, NESN’s VP of technology, in a statement.
Akamai said its streaming network spans 4,100 locations across 135 countries and can provide high-quality viewing across different network types and connection speeds.
Boston sports fans who download NESN 360 can watch games by a direct subscription or authenticating with a participating TV provider on their iPhone, Android, Apple TV, Fire TV and Google TV. A subscription through NESN costs $29.99 a month. The first game streamed under this new partnership will be the Bruins home opener on Saturday, Oct. 15.
NESN says it is the first U.S. regional sports network to stream Major League Baseball and National Hockey League games in 4K/HDR natively through a streaming app.
Akamai announced this new partnership on the heels of several big acquisitions over the last year. In February the company announced it was buying cloud computing company Linode LLC for approximately $900 million in cash. Linode provides virtual private servers as an infrastructure-as-a-service platform. Just over a year ago, Akamai paid about $600 million to acquire Israel-based Guardicore to strengthen its cybersecurity portfolio.
Prior to these deals, Akamai made a series of yearly layoffs. In February 2021, the Boston Business Journal reported that Akamai reduced its workforce by approximately 2%. About 160 employees were impacted. One year prior, Akamai disclosed that it cut its global workforce by at least 75. This was less than a year after laying off 140 people.
