Rabat Ice Hockey Arena

Morocco’s capital city of Rabat continues to cement its position as a pillar of international sporting infrastructure. The latest milestone in that ambition is the new Rabat Ice Hockey Arena. They have added a new Olympic-sized ice hockey rink that doubles as a multipurpose event space, integrating lighting, structural elements, LED walls and a high-performance audio system.
 
Recognized as the largest and most modern hockey arena on the African continent, the venue sets a new benchmark for sports and entertainment infrastructure in the region. At its heart, there is a K-array sound system specified to fill the entire arena with immersive, intelligible audio for any event.
 
The project was delivered by Cegelec, a subsidiary of VINCI Energies that specializes in consulting, design, engineering, construction and the maintenance of commercial and industrial buildings and infrastructure projects at large. Cegelec’s audiovisual division managed the installation of professional equipment across the venue. K-array equipment for the project was supplied through EcmaPro Systems, the brand's exclusive distributor in Morocco.
 
The brief was ambitious and precise. The venue required an audio system capable of supporting 360-degree entertainment across a wide variety of use cases, from speeches and sporting announcements to music performances and large-scale public events.
 
Large sports venues present a complex acoustic environment. Reverberation, crowd noise and structural reflections can significantly undermine intelligibility, particularly in a space designed to accommodate thousands of spectators. A compact, precisely controlled system was essential, and it needed to be capable of delivering high output without creating the acoustic problems that less directional alternatives can introduce.
 
K-array’s combination of line array technology, active subwoofers and integrated DSP amplification met those requirements while remaining architecturally unobtrusive. The installed system consists of 48 Mugello-KH2P I passive line array elements, 16 Thunder-KS3 I active subwoofers and nine Kommander-KA208 amplifiers.
 
The KH2P I is a slim, dual-8" line array element incorporating K-array's Electronic Beam Steering technology, which allows sound beam dispersion to be digitally adjusted for precise aiming across the listening area, while mechanical steering provides additional command over both horizontal and vertical coverage patterns.
 
The Thunder-KS3 I is a compact active subwoofer built around a 21" cone driver and a 4 × 2,500W DSP amplifier module, complemented by the eight-channel Kommander-KA208 at 2,500W per channel. Both are integrated with the K-array Connect ecosystem, enabling remote configuration and signal routing of the entire system via mobile app. The KA208 is also manageable at scale via K-framework3, K-array's professional loudspeaker design and system tuning software.
 
K-array’s engineering team worked closely with Cegelec throughout the project, providing system design consultation, acoustic modelling and analysis, on-site setup and tuning, and audiometric measurements and optimization. The collaborative approach ensured the final system met the performance requirements of a modern multipurpose arena.
 
“Installing a system of this scale in a purpose-built hockey arena brings its own set of acoustic demands,” says Najib Bouskour, director of Axians, a VINCI Energies company. “K-array’s combination of precise beam control and clean high output gave us the tools to achieve consistent coverage throughout the venue, whether the arena is hosting a hockey match, a concert or anything else.”
 
The inauguration of the arena underlined both the quality of the installation and the wider ambitions of the venue. At the first tournament held on the ice, Morocco’s national hockey team claimed the championship, defeating several competitors, including the Portuguese national team.
 
Looking ahead, the hockey arena will host the 2026 IIHF Men’s Development Cup in June, bringing international ice hockey to Rabat and to the African continent at that level for the first time. With a K-array system engineered for long-term reliability and flexibility across event formats, the arena is ready to meet that occasion and every event that follows.