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Introduction

AI-Powered Fan Engagement in Real Time

Client: A leading B2B sports technology and content solutions provider.
Industry: Sports Media, Technology

Unlocking a new level of scalability and solving a technical Gordian knot through automated content creation.

Real-Time Content Challenge

Challenge

The inaccessibility of real-time scaling for high-quality social media content generation during live sporting events was resulting in high operational costs and missed opportunities for fan engagement. The client wanted a reliable and long-term solution.

Solution

One of our Agentic AI pods developed a bespoke, low-latency, AI-powered content generation engine (called “Cricket LLM”) that enables interactive fan engagement in real time without compromising performance under increased workloads during game time.

Key Outcomes

Comprehensive Success
Total automation of in-match tweet generation, eliminating the need for a six-person content 'war room' during games.
Exceeded Expectations
The finished product can generate content ready for publishing in under fifteen seconds, beating the critical twenty-second window for content engagement.
Solved Quickly
A complex challenge that had harried the client for three years, Indexnine was able to provide a solution in two months.
Proven Scalability
We’ve built a foundational platform that enables the client to continue expanding operations in real-time content automation across multiple sports, leagues, and social media channels.

Cricket LLM Solution

Challenge

High Stakes, High Pressure, High Speed

In sports media, an industry estimated to reach $1.19 billion by 2030, the game on the field isn’t the battle. The real clash happens in the digital arena, on the timelines of millions of fans demanding instant analysis, reactions, and opportunities for engagement. For this leading sports media provider, a premier digital agency managing content for top-tier sports leagues and teams, victory in this arena is its core business.

Their most critical and time-sensitive operation revolved around live-tweeting during matches. The formula for success was brutal: when a pivotal moment happened—an interception, a game-changing play, a buzzer beater—a creative, on-brand, and factually accurate tweet had to hit the timeline within twenty seconds. Any longer and the moment’s lost, drowned out by the next play, rival outlets, or the oncoming tidal wave of reactions from individual fans. As a sports media firm, twenty seconds is all you’ve got.

To meet this demand, the client relied on a costly “war room,” a team of six expert content specialists and sports experts working in frantic unison during every single match. The method posed significant problems in terms of burnout, human error, consistency, and resource intensity. For scalability, the only way to cover more matches or expand to new sports was to hire more specialists, creating an untenable rate of growth to operational cost.

The client knew this method was unsustainable, but without a reliable alternative, they couldn’t cut out the unwieldy process. For three years, the company’s internal teams tried to automate this process. They understood the problem, but lacked the depth of expertise necessary to architect a solution capable of handling the novel challenge of simultaneous speed, creativity, and contextual understanding. They were stuck in a cycle of manual overload, unable to scale the most critical part of their business.

Our Solution

Content Automation Powered By AI

When the client engaged us, they came with a specific problem. Our approach, rooted in our AI Potential, Readiness, and Risk (P2R) Assessment framework, began with strategy. We knew this wasn’t just about generating tweets; it was about decoupling their growth from their headcount and automating quality content creation.

Phase 1: The AI Assessment - Defining the Opportunity

Our Applied AI and Discovery studios initiated the engagement with a rapid, targeted assessment. Instead of jumping straight into development, we first mapped their content workflow to identify bottlenecks and quantify the business impact. From this data, we could extract actionable insights and engineer for maximum impact. Framing the project not just as a technical task, but as a transformative initiative with a clear ROI, we had our objective: build a platform capable of continually scaling their real-time engagement to meet demand reliably and effectively.

Phase 2: The Architecture - Engineering Cricket LLM

Architecting a solution for this this would require technical sophistication far beyond picking off-the-shelf AI tools. Our Agentic AI pod, a specialized team of full-stack AI engineers, architected a bespoke, low-latency AI engine. The solution had to master three complex domains simultaneously:

Real-Time Data Ingestion

We built a high-throughput, event-driven pipeline capable of consuming live sports data feeds with sub-second latency. This pipeline acts as the central nervous system, triggering the AI brain at the precise moment of action.

Context-Aware Generative AI

The core of the solution is a proprietary model we dubbed “Cricket LLM.” Far beyond a regular chatbot, its architecture included dynamic prompt engineering to optimize the quality of content output, a multi-layered validation system to ensure only brand-aligned content is greenlit, and a language model fine-tuned on a massive pool of sports commentary, player statistics, and, crucially, the client’s historical content.

Scalable MLOps Pipeline

Knowing an AI model is only as good as the infrastructure running it, we built a robust MLOps pipeline to manage the entire lifecycle of Cricket LLM. This included automated model retraining, performance monitoring, and a CI/CD process to ensure the engine continuously improves and adapts without manual intervention.

Phase 3: Outcome-Oriented Delivery

Throughout the two-month engagement, our Agentic AI pod worked in tight, agile sprints. We operated on a model of sprint commitments, where we guaranteed the delivery of specific outcomes at each stage. This de-risked the project for the client, ensuring they saw tangible progress and value every step of the way. We didn’t just promise a solution; we demonstrated it, culminating in a successful live deployment during the Indian Premier League season.

Transforming a Cost Center Into a Growth Engine

Results & Impact

90%

Cost Reduction

15sec

Generation Time

10x

Content Volume

24/7

Real-Time Operations

After the success of the pilot, the client chose to engage Indexnine once again to handle the complexities of MLOps, model maintenance, and multi-platform integration involved in further scaling operations. This re-engagement of Indexnine to lead the next phase of the product’s growth is a commitment we take very seriously, as both a testament to the deep, specialized expertise we bring and an opportunity to continue facilitating our client’s success.

Why It Worked

This success story is a direct result of the core principles that differentiate Indexnine:

Excellence Values Delivered

Product-centric Development:
This wasn’t a run-of-the-mill AI project. On top of extensive expertise across AI technologies, it required the seamless collaboration. Our Discovery, Applied AI, and Engineering studios each contributed to extract strategic insights through data analysis and frame the business problem, to design the model, and to build the data pipelines and infrastructure, respectively. This integrated approach is a unique cornerstone of our operation.
3X Engineers:
This project demanded more than just coders. It required engineers with a deep understanding of MLOps, data architecture, and LLMs, combined with a product mindset to grasp the business context of fan engagement and brand voice.
A Founder's Mindset:
We took ownership of a problem that had stymied a capable tech organization for years. We didn't just deliver a service; we delivered a strategic business transformation, demonstrating our core belief that our success is intrinsically linked to our clients'.

For companies looking at what’s beyond the AI hype and wanting to drive real, measurable results, the Sports Interactive story serves as a powerful blueprint. It demonstrates that with the right strategic partner, the most complex AI challenges can be transformed into major growth opportunities.

Ready to Engineer Your Perfect Pivot?

For any company at a strategic crossroads, we provide the transformative power of strategic product engineering. Our work with Zilla reinforces our firm belief that, with the right partner, a major challenge can be engineered into a market-defining opportunity.

Want to take your product to the next level? So do we. Set up a free consultation with Indexnine today.