Verity Butler

With the men’s FIFA World Cup underway, FEED’s 2026 sports special explores AR in sports broadcasting, emerging gamification trends, must-have fan apps and football’s AI revolution With the men’s FIFA World Cup kicking off yesterday, we thought there was no better time to unveil our June Signal, which is also FEED’s 2026 sports special. In this month’s content drop, we’re exploring the innovations transforming how fans watch, play and engage with sport.

When Reading FC appointed Stuart Fenton as head of AI, it marked a crucial turning point for UK sport. The League One club became the first professional football club in the UK to create a dedicated head of AI role, declaring itself as the spearhead of a technological shift that many believe will transform the sport over the next decade. For Fenton, his role is about much more than introducing the latest technology trend to the football club.

Cloud-first was the promise. But is it a hybrid reality that the industry is building instead? The broadcast and streaming industry has always been shaped by technological shifts, but few have been as crucial (or certainly not as widely debated!) as the move to the cloud. What began as a gradual exploration of virtualised infrastructure has, over the past decade, evolved into a fundamental rethinking of how media businesses operate.