Live production is an environment where every second counts. Hardware signal chains are planned to perfection, workflows are rehearsed, and teams are ready for anything. But even the best-prepared crews can face the one scenario nobody sees coming: something essential doesn’t arrive.
Earlier this year, a global sports brand was preparing to broadcast one of its flagship live broadcasts. As the production team ran their standard checks onsite, they realised a key set of captioning encoders — critical for accessibility and international reach — hadn’t made it onto the onsite broadcast truck.
There was no time to ship a replacement. And with a worldwide audience tuning in, captions weren’t optional.
So they turned to CaptionHub.
A phone call hours before the stream began resulted in establishing an entirely new commercial relationship and technology solution.
Within minutes, they were logged into Timbra, our cloud-native, AI-powered localisation suite, running test captions directly into the live production chain via their Brightcove platform for playout. No rewiring. No specialist engineering staffing changes. Just a browser login and fast integration with their existing workflow and video distribution chain.
Key brand terminology was uploaded to ensure accuracy. Latency and sync were checked and approved. When the broadcast went live, captions were exactly where they needed to be, and audiences never knew anything had gone off-plan.
The team’s takeaway was simple:
If Timbra can support a global broadcast at the last minute, imagine what it can do when it’s brought in from the start.
Cloud flexibility meets broadcast reliability
This wasn’t about choosing cloud instead of hardware. Production environments will always remain hybrid, with physical infrastructure playing a critical role.
What this proved is the value of having localisation that can be activated quickly, wherever the team is, with whatever setup is in place that day.
Timbra slots into existing workflows without friction, giving teams the agility to scale to more audiences and more regions in real time.
It’s resilience built into the localisation layer.
Captions are now part of audience strategy
Captions aren’t just for compliance anymore, they now directly influence engagement and global reach:
- 69% of consumers watch video without sound (Verizon Media), especially on mobile — captions ensure content is still seen, understood, and engaged with
- Localising into new languages unlocks new regions, markets, and revenue opportunities
- Accessibility expectations from a legal standpoint are becoming standard across platforms
When captioning can scale instantly, audience reach becomes a strategic decision, not a technical limitation.
Timbra enables all of this through one cloud platform, helping organisations consolidate, simplify, and expand.
Don’t wait for a missing encoder moment
Whether you’re planning a high-profile broadcast, a global product launch, or a major internal event, Timbra can be live in minutes.
Timbra is consolidated, efficient, and hardware-free. One AI-powered, cloud-based platform delivers multilingual captions to every audience — broadcast viewers, in-room displays, companion devices, and web players — without adding complexity.
With support for 200+ languages, custom dictionaries for brand accuracy, and full control from a browser, Timbra ensures localisation is never the blocker when plans shift unexpectedly.
Cloud isn’t replacing hardware in the live event space. It’s making sure audiences are always included, wherever and however they tune in.
If you have a live moment coming up and want to reach every audience across every screen, we’d love to show you how quickly Timbra can help you scale.
Bring Timbra to your next live moment — fast.
Get set up and testing in minutes for your upcoming event.