Blue Jeans Network Partners With Derek Jeter and The Players' Tribune

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA and NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwired - Feb 19, 2015) -  Blue Jeans Network, the global leader in cloud-based video collaboration and interactive event services, today announced a strategic partnership with The Players' Tribune, and its founder Derek Jeter, enabling athletes and fans to engage with one another in a whole new way.

As part of the strategic partnership, Blue Jeans Primetime technology will be integrated into The Players' Tribune media platform to provide interactive video events and experiences for athletes, readers, and fans on the site, www.theplayerstribune.com.

At the February 14 launch event in New York City, Blue Jeans video collaboration technology helped assemble a virtual panel of athletes and The Players' Tribune contributors to introduce the new media platform to their colleagues, the media and fans. The all star panel included Derek Jeter, Seattle Seahawks Quarterback Russell Wilson, LA Clippers Forward Blake Griffin, New York Mets Pitcher Matt Harvey, Pittsburgh Pirates Outfielder Andrew McCutchen, LPGA Golfer Stacy Lewis, and Retired NBA star Jason Collins, and was moderated by Talk Show Host Andy Cohen. Athletes such as Blake Griffin, who were unable to attend in person, were able to participate on the panel by joining over Blue Jeans.

"I am excited to partner with Blue Jeans Network," said Derek Jeter. "I founded The Players' Tribune with the goal to capture the voice of the game, with first-person stories directly from athletes. Now with Blue Jeans' interactive video capabilities, we can empower athletes and contributors to engage directly, face-to-face with each other, and with their fans in new and unique ways."

"The Players' Tribune is a game changer in the media and sports landscape and Derek Jeter is a true visionary," said Krish Ramakrishnan, CEO of Blue Jeans Network. "We are thrilled to be the technology partner for interactive video events and experiences. Together, we will redefine how athletes and fans interact, creating new and better opportunities to share stories and experiences, bring the Tribune articles to life and directly connect the athletes to their audiences. This is exactly the application that Blue Jeans Primetime was built for."

Blue Jeans Primetime will make it possible for The Players' Tribune to let athletes engage with fans online and face-to-face from anywhere for story telling, discussion groups, or Q&A sessions. Unlike conventional fan engagement tools, Blue Jeans Primetime makes the experience interactive, dynamic, and real-time.

The Blue Jeans Primetime service, which debuted last month by extending the reach of the Sundance Film Festival, is the first fully interactive large-scale video events service. It blends together the engagement of video conferencing, with large scale broadcasting capabilities, and an industry first video promotion capability. With Blue Jeans Primetime, for the first time a group of interactive participants can present and stream to an audience of thousands of passive viewers, and promote any of these viewers to be two-way video participants as needed in the live event.

About Blue Jeans Network
At Blue Jeans Network, we aim to bring great minds together to meet, share ideas and reach their audience through the power of video collaboration. By making video communication easy, secure and scalable, our customers can make online conversations, meetings and events personal again. Blue Jeans' cloud-based platform has taken video into the mainstream, giving thought leaders in business, entertainment, media, and sports the power to interact face-to-face with anyone, anywhere.

About The Players' Tribune
The Players' Tribune is an innovative digital sports content platform created and curated by some of the world's top athletes. The brainchild of baseball legend Derek Jeter, the goal is to bring fans closer to the games they love by offering fresh content, produced daily, from the unique perspective of the pros. The Players' Tribune also employs a team of seasoned writers, editors and producers who continually deliver the highest quality content as well as breaking news, lifestyle pieces and video and audio content. Visit The Players' Tribune www.theplayerstribune.com.