UNICON 22 – Digital Platform for an International Major Sporting Event
How several coordinated systems digitally support a world championship – from the public website and internal collaboration to the registration application.
In brief
For the Unicycling World Championships 2026 in Steyr (Austria), Benjamin Fischer was responsible for four clearly defined systems: the central event website (Shopware 6), Nextcloud for team collaboration, the listmonk newsletter and custom registration applications. These systems supported the event from preparation through live operations in summer 2026 and continue to be maintained – publicly verifiable at unicon22.at.
Project Overview
UNICON 22 was the Unicycling World Championships and Convention 2026 in Steyr, Austria (24 July – 7 August 2026): more than 30 disciplines, two weeks of programme and participants from all over the world. An event of this size needs a reliable digital foundation – for information, organisation and registration.
Benjamin Fischer (IT Hummel) designed and built the Shopware-based event website, accompanied it through preparation and live event operations, and continues to maintain it. In addition, he set up and operated Nextcloud, the listmonk newsletter and custom registration applications.
- Event
- Unicycling World Championships and Convention 2026
- Location & Period
- Steyr, Austria · 24 July – 7 August 2026 (competition programme from 25 July)
- Role
- Conception, setup & ongoing technical support
- Technologies
- Shopware 6 · Nextcloud · listmonk · Individualentwicklung
Note: UNICON 22 is supported by several partners; Acris is publicly named as the event's technical partner. This case study describes the specific systems and tasks for which Benjamin Fischer is responsible.
Challenge
An international major event poses particular challenges: content in several languages, constantly growing information (disciplines, schedules, venues, accommodation, results, livestreams), an international audience across time zones – and a largely volunteer-based organising team that needs simple, reliable tools. The systems had to run throughout the multi-year preparation period while remaining flexible to extend.
Requirements
- Public website with extensive, multilingual content – from disciplines and schedules to livestreams
- Platform for internal collaboration and file storage of the organising team
- Own newsletter system with signup process and public archive – self-hosted and privacy-friendly
- Custom registration applications for individual event formats with participant limits
- Long-term stable operations with updates, backups and technical support
System Architecture
Four coordinated systems cover the different needs of the event – deliberately separated by purpose so each system remains simple, maintainable and independently updatable.
- unicon22.at Shopware 6 Public event website: disciplines, venues, registration, schedule, results, livestreams
- cloud.unicon22.at Nextcloud Internal collaboration and file storage for the organising team
- newsletter.unicon22.at listmonk Newsletter signup and mailing list archive, self-hosted
Public Event Platform
The centrepiece is the public website based on Shopware 6. It bundles all event information: disciplines, venues, registration, accommodation, schedule, results, livestreams and ongoing updates – multilingual for an international audience.
Shopware was deliberately used as a flexible content and event platform: custom content pages, structured information areas and the integration of further services – as clean, update-safe extensions instead of interventions in the system core.
Live project: www.unicon22.at
Internal Collaboration
A self-hosted Nextcloud was set up and technically maintained for the organising team. It serves as the central file storage and collaboration platform – with full control over the data and no dependency on external cloud providers.
Newsletter Infrastructure
The event newsletter runs on a self-hosted listmonk system: signup via the website, mailing list management and a public archive of sent issues. Self-hosted here means full data control and no transfer of subscriber data to external newsletter services.
Custom Event Applications
For event formats no standard system covers, a custom web application was built – among others for registration for the unicycle triathlon: multilingual interface, clear registration process and a server-side enforced participant limit (180 places, first come, first serve).
Live example: convention.unicon22.at
Technical Responsibility
The responsibility includes setup and configuration of the four systems mentioned, updates, backups, SSL/TLS hardening and the continuous extension of content and functionality – from early preparations through live event operations in summer 2026 to ongoing support today. Other areas of the event (e.g. ticketing partners or timekeeping) were handled by other service providers.
Technologies Used
- Shopware 6
- Nextcloud
- listmonk
- PHP
- Linux
- SSL/TLS
Only publicly verifiable core technologies are listed – no internal infrastructure details.
Operations & Support
All systems were maintained throughout the preparation and event period – with regular updates, working backups and fast response to problems – and continue to be looked after now that the event is over. Reliability is crucial for a fixed date: the registration and information systems had to work during the hot phase.
Result
A publicly verifiable system landscape that digitally supported an international world championship and remains in operation: public website, internal collaboration, newsletter and custom registration processes – built and maintained from a single source within the areas of responsibility, with open-source technologies and data kept under the organisation's own control.
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