How we partnered to launch new AI features to fans within ten days
In October 2024, we announced that Viam had become the Official AI Technology Partner of the UBS Arena and the New York Islanders. Since then, Viam engineers have been hard at work helping the team at UBS Arena deliver an exceptional experience for fans attending Islanders games.
In this blog post, we’ll dive into how we built QuickQueue, UBS Arena’s new AI-powered app feature that’s enhancing the fan experience from face-off to the final goal, and what we’re planning next.
Delivering a state-of-the-art fan experience with AI
As New York’s newest premier entertainment and sports venue, UBS Arena—which opened its doors in 2021—aims to be state-of-the-art. The team behind the arena is focused on giving fans an unmatched live entertainment experience. They came to Viam to explore using AI to ensure every fan’s experience is as great as possible, reducing hassles like waiting for concessions or restrooms so fans can focus on rooting for the Islanders.
To prove value fast, we set an ambitious goal of delivering a production-ready feature for UBS Arena’s mobile app that would reduce the amount of time fans spend waiting in line—within 15 business days.
First results: Optimizing crowd flow with QuickQueue
The feature we envisioned would use AI to process existing camera feeds to evaluate wait time in lines. It’s most fans’ least favorite part of any arena experience: waiting to order nachos or a hot dog, waiting to use the restroom, anything that takes away from the game itself. For our first use case, we focused on restroom lines.
The Viam platform plugs directly into existing infrastructure, such as cameras and sensors, which made it easy to get started: we simply deployed our software on top of UBS Arena’s security cameras. Then we trained a computer vision model that identifies the number of people waiting in line for a restroom and calculates the wait time accordingly.
“Counting the number of people in a line is harder than it sounds,” says Bill Hyland, Solutions Engineer at Viam. “You have to figure out who’s in line and who’s just near the line, or passing by. You might have lines that aren’t always visible to cameras.” We worked closely with UBS Arena stakeholders to overcome these challenges, calibrating the model and even tweaking camera angles to capture more imagery.
Within 10 business days—faster than our original timeline—we launched QuickQueue: a new fan experience that’s fully integrated within UBS Arena’s mobile app. Since then, we’ve expanded QuickQueue to make it easier to quickly order concessions.
Fans can even filter vendors by offerings and dietary restrictions and easily see, for example, how long they’d wait to order from the nearest vendor offering gluten-free items or their favorite bar.
“Fans can now track down their favorite foods, find the shortest lines to secure the goods, and make it back to their seats — all before the next big goal,” says Alexis Coates, Head of Customer Success at Viam. “We’re working hand-in-hand with the UBS Arena team to keep pushing this technology forward, with even more game-day innovations in the pipeline.”
What’s next: Further improving the fan experience
Now that QuickQueue is fully operational for all kinds of lines throughout the arena, we’re taking on the parking lot—optimizing driving patterns for cars and shuttle services. It’s an opportunity to truly improve the end-to-end fan experience, minimizing frustration so fans can focus on what they care about most, from arrival to departure.
Delivering impactful use cases fast is possible thanks to the Viam platform, which allows organizations to quickly deploy AI by bridging the gap between physical devices and AI algorithms. Viam makes it easy to gather data from existing hardware and turn it into AI models, work that would otherwise take months or years (and large engineering teams) to complete.
Learn more about how Viam can help your venue enhance guest experiences, optimize build operations, and drive revenue opportunities.