IBC calling industry ‘Champions’ to submit ideas for Accelerator 2026

IBC has announced the official call for challenge submissions to the Accelerator Media Innovation Programme 2026, inviting forward-thinking organisations from across the global media and entertainment ecosystem to propose collaborative innovation challenges that will help shape the future of the industry.

Now entering its eighth year, the Accelerator Programme continues to drive real-world experimentation through global collaboration, uniting media and entertainment (M&E) ‘Champions’ (the buyers of technology, such as broadcasters, studios, content and rights owners, streamers, games organisations) with technology vendors, start-ups and academic partners to solve some of the industry’s most pressing business and technology challenges.

Each Accelerator project is built around the challenges submitted by Champions from across the broad M&E landscape, tackling transformation and disruption across the sector, in areas such as AI, connectivity, immersive media, cloud workflows, content distribution, virtual production, content provenance, cyber security, and sustainability.

In 2025, BBC, ITV, Verizon, Sky Sports, Channel 4, France Télévisions, Comcast, Globo, and the EBU were among the 80+ media and tech leaders who developed breakthrough projects in areas such as AI agent assistants, generative AI, sustainable streaming, ultra-low latency delivery, and private 5G networks.

The 2026 Call for Challenges is now open, with a submission deadline of Friday, 5th December 2025 at 5 pm GMT.

IBC will select up to 12 challenge submissions to go forward to the next round of on-stage pitches at its Kickstart Day event, which will once again take place at the BBC Radio Theatre in BBC Broadcasting House on Wednesday, 25th February 2026. The event will also feature industry agenda-setting keynotes and innovation-focused discussions on technology trends and challenges. 

From the Kickstart Day event, IBC will select the final projects that will go forward for development over the course of the following six months, culminating in live proof of concept (PoC) showcases and demonstrations at IBC 2026, taking place in Amsterdam from 11th to 14th September 2026.

Mark Smith, IBC Council Chair and Lead, IBC Accelerator Programme, said, “The Accelerator Programme is a completely unique industry platform that facilitates genuine collaboration and experimentation.

“Each year we see new, practical innovations emerge from cross-industry partnerships that are applied to real-world use cases — and we can’t wait to see the challenges that will define the 2026 edition of the programme.”