Applications
BBC launches app for Olympics
MUMBAI: BBC Sport has launched an Olympics application for Android and iOS smartphones in the UK.
The free app offers up to 24 streams of live events coverage, comprehensive schedule and results pages, and daily news stories which can be saved for offline reading, ensuring you never miss a moment of the Games, wherever you are.
Alongside live streaming, catch-up coverage and highlights, the app ensures that users always have a Games guide even on-the-go. Offering facts, stats and information, the app generates pages for every athlete, country and sport, updated in real-time. You can also access live daily text commentaries, news stories and a detailed schedule and results section covering every Olympics event.
Extra functionality allows stories to be saved for offline reading, ensuring the latest information is accessible even when mobile reception is unavailable. Additionally, iOS users can personalise the app by adding their favourite Olympics sports to the customisable tab bar, enabling quick access to the latest live action.
BBC News and Knowledge GM Phil Fearnley said, “For the first truly digital Olympics, we needed to ensure that everyone could access our quality coverage wherever they were, across multiple devices. The free BBC Sport Olympics app for UK Android and iOS smartphones ensures that everything you need to keep up-to-date with the action is right there at your fingertips. Even when you’re out of range of 3G or wireless, we’ll still be able to deliver the latest news to you offline.”
Both versions of the app are available for UK smartphone users only. The iOS app is optimised for handsets with iOS 5.0 and above installed. The Android version is optimised for handsets with OS 2.2 and Flash installed.
The Android app can be downloaded now from the Android App Store.
The iOS app can be downloaded from the iTunes App Store.
A shortcut app for Blackberry users, which creates a bookmark for the BBC Olympics mobile website, is available from Blackberry App World.
BBC coverage of the 2012 Olympics can also be enjoyed on mobile phones via the mobile browser version of the BBC Sport website.
Applications
Inshorts Group chief Deepit Purkayastha joins IAB video council for Southeast Asia and India
The co-founder and chief executive of the short-form content platform has been inducted into the IAB SEA+India Video Council, giving India a stronger voice in shaping digital video frameworks
NOIDA: India has long been the world’s most chaotic, multilingual and mobile-first digital market. Now, one of its most prominent short-video executives is getting a seat at the table where the rules are written.
Deepit Purkayastha, co-founder and chief executive of Inshorts Group, has been selected as a member of the IAB SEA+India Video Council for 2026. Run by the Interactive Advertising Bureau, the council brings together senior leaders from Southeast Asia and India to shape standards, best practices and measurement frameworks for the fast-evolving video and digital advertising ecosystem.
The timing is pointed. According to the IAMAI-Kantar Internet in India Report 2025, over 588 million Indians are now consuming short-video content, with growth increasingly driven by rural and non-metro audiences. India’s active internet user base has crossed 950 million, with 57 per cent of users now coming from rural markets. Yet the frameworks that govern how video consumption is measured and monetised were largely designed for single-language, Western markets and have struggled to keep pace with the scale, diversity and complexity of India’s digital landscape.
Purkayastha is no stranger to these debates. He already serves on the AI Council at Marketing and Media Alliance India and as co-chair of the Digital Entertainment Committee at the Internet and Mobile Association of India. His induction into the IAB SEA+India Video Council extends that influence into the global video standards arena.
Inshorts Group sits squarely at the intersection of these forces. Its flagship product, Inshorts, India’s highest-rated short news app, reaches 12 million active users with 60-word news summaries. Its sister platform, Public App, reaches 80 million monthly active users across more than 700 districts and 12 languages, serving communities that most global platforms barely register.
Purkayastha said the opportunity was about building something more representative. “India today sits at the centre of the global video ecosystem, but the frameworks that define how value is created and measured have not always kept pace with the realities of our market,” he said. “Being part of the IAB SEA+India Video Council is an opportunity to contribute to a more representative and future-ready approach, one that accounts for diversity in language, context, and user intent.”
As a council member, Purkayastha will contribute to shaping regional standards across video advertising, measurement and platform governance, with a focus on frameworks that are native to India’s multilingual, mobile-first ecosystem rather than imported from global benchmarks designed elsewhere.
For years, India has been content to play by rules written for other markets. Purkayastha’s induction is a signal that it is done waiting to be consulted and ready to start writing them.
