We’re back from Vegas. Slightly jet lagged, a bit hoarse, and with plenty to unpack.

NAB has a way of showing you where the industry actually is, rather than where it says it is. This year, the signal was unusually consistent. Not one big headline, but the same direction surfacing across conversations, demos and keynotes.

We went out there with a clear view of where live production is heading. What stood out is how many others are now moving in the same direction. AI embedded into workflows, cloud production treated as standard, and vertical and social formats shaping how content is actually consumed.

On our side, we were showing what that looks like in practice. Real-time vertical outputs from a single feed. Live production in the browser. Clipping, captioning and publishing happening as the moment unfolds.

More importantly, we spent the week talking to the teams trying to make all of this work every day. Broadcasters, rights holders, content teams,  all asking the same questions around scale, efficiency and how to reach audiences that aren’t sitting in front of a traditional broadcast on TV.

The takeaway is clear. The industry isn’t debating the direction anymore. It’s figuring out how to execute on it.

Here’s what we saw, what we heard, and what it means for teams trying to scale live production across platforms, formats and new audiences.

AI has moved from talking point to production reality

Last year, AI was everywhere in the messaging. This year, it showed up in the workflows.

Across the show floor, the examples that landed weren’t replacing operators. They were removing the work around the work. Clipping. Captioning. Reframing. Automating the moments around the moment so teams can focus on the editorial decisions where human storytelling shines. 

That’s how we think about it too.

We’re taking a single live feed and turning it into platform-native outputs in real time. Vertical video that follows the action without needing a second operator. Highlights that are clipped and published as the moment happens. Captions generated instantly, without cumbersome downloads and uploads. 

The value isn’t in the AI itself. It’s in what it removes. Time, effort, and the gap between something happening and it reaching an audience.

Cloud production has moved from consideration to execution

There was a time when cloud production felt like a bet. That conversation has moved on quickly.

Across NAB the conversation has shifted from “does it work?” to “how can we run it effectively at scale?”

Reliability, efficiency, cost per hour of broadcast output. That’s where the attention is now.

That’s where cloud services offer the greatest upside. 

With Grabyo Live, the entire production environment sits in the browser. Ingest, switching, graphics, distribution, all in one distributed platform. No trucks, no fixed infrastructure, no need to move hardware around the world.

The impact is measurable. Teams like TV8 Mont Blanc are cutting production costs significantly without compromising output. Others are scaling to more feeds, more formats and more destinations, without growing headcount at the same rate.

The question isn’t whether to move to the cloud. It’s how quickly you can make it work for your internal teams and the demands of the audience.

Live sports and social are setting the pace

Sport is still driving the industry. NAB’s Sports Summit expanded again this year. Milan Cortina just closed. The FIFA World Cup is next. Every step-change in live production is happening around live sport.

And the brief from rights holders is evolving.

More outputs. More platforms. More formats. More moments. Without increasing complexity or cost.

That’s where the shift to social-first workflows becomes impossible to ignore.

The most valuable piece of content from a live event isn’t always the live broadcast. It’s the clip that reaches fans first. The vertical video that lands in a feed before the moment has even settled.

That’s exactly what Grabyo Studio is built to support. Not just clipping and publishing, but running the entire live-to-social workflow in one platform. From live ingest and real-time clipping across multiple events in the same screen, to AI-assisted captioning and translations, vertical reframing, monetization and distribution – all happening as the event unfolds.

The schedule isn’t setting the pace anymore. The audience is. We spoke to teams now rebuilding their entire workflow around that shift. Distributed, collaborative, Paced by the audience, not the broadcast schedule.

The conversations behind the demos

The demos matter. The conversations matter more.

NAB is where you hear what teams are dealing with. Not just what they’re interested in, but what they’re trying to solve.

A broadcaster trying to serve a second-screen audience without doubling their team. A sports federation looking to bring production in-house without major upfront investment. A news organisation trying to simplify a stack of disconnected tools.

All of them pointed to the same underlying need. Less fragmentation. More control. Faster workflows.

A few themes came up repeatedly.

The definition of “broadcast” is shifting, especially when the largest audiences are often on social platforms. The trust that professional production can happen in a browser is growing quickly. New tools for changing audience needs, and a recognition that video needs to be everywhere, all at once.

Where we go from here

NAB 2026 confirmed what has been building for a while.

Cloud, AI and social-first production are no longer future concepts. They’re operational realities.

The challenge now isn’t understanding where things are heading. It’s making it work, consistently and at scale.

That’s the problem we’re focused on.

If we didn’t get the chance to catch up in Vegas and you’re looking to produce more content, for more platforms, without adding more complexity, book a demo with the team. 

Thanks to everyone who stopped by the booth, shared ideas or challenged our thinking, it was great to connect with so many of you.

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