Going live Shane Richmond on a whole new box of tricks | Page 2
The power behind decisions
AUGUST 2014
Why you’ll never watch alone
Going viral Sarah Wood on chasing the holy grail | Page 5
Connected TV
How Liverpool FC connect to a global TV audience of up to 500 million every time they play | Pages 8-9 Image courtesy of liverpoolfc.com
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Business Technology · August 2014
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Connected TV
Opening shots Shane Richmond
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HERE’S an old joke about a man lost in the countryside who asks a farmer for directions, only to be told: “If I were you, I wouldn’t start from here.” The punchline is a good summary of the current state of connected televisions: a raft of incompatible services, a tangle of competing set-top boxes and content that appears on and disappears from content platforms as if at random. It’s easy to see how we got here. In the beginning there was the television, which plugged into an aerial and received live transmissions from a small selection of channels. You watched what was on, when it was on, or you missed it. Then came video recorders, bringing timeshifted viewing and tapes to rent and buy. The rise of satellite and cable TV brought set-top boxes, which have retained their name despite modern TVs being too thin to support any kind of box. And then we got games consoles and, more recently, internet-connected boxes, dongles and gizmos. In each case it was easier and cheaper to add the new technology as a box, plugged into the TV, than to wait for it to be built in and then buy a new set. That means that by the time TVs do include technology such as, say, a digital video recorder (DVR), most people are already using one via a separate box. While we refresh our mobile phones every two years and our laptops every four years, TVs are, for many, a once-a-decade purchase.
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THE ESSENTIALS
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Why we’ll carry on attaching boxes to our infrequently upgraded televisions Technology that comes along in the meantime just gets added on. A July 2014 report by Strategy Analytics said that smart TVs will make up 73 per cent of global flat-screen TV shipments by 2017, compared with just 33 per cent last year. That makes sense – as new technology gets cheaper it works its way from high-end models down to the cheapest sets. But how many people will buy TVs to get their hands on smart features such as catch-up TV apps and streaming content? Plenty of people already have them on satellite or cable boxes, games consoles or some other internet-connected box, such as Apple TV. If you really want BBC iPlayer are you going to drop £800 on a new TV or £50 on a Roku stick? If you’re going to buy a new TV anyway then, sure, it will be a smart TV but you might never connect it to the internet. Strategy Analytics proposes that TV refresh Twitter: @ cycles will shorten as prices fall but I remain shanerichmond
sceptical. Ask yourself how cheap TVs would have to get before you would buy one every couple of years. And what would you do with the old ones? They take up more space than that drawer full of old mobiles. My ideal smart TV is a screen that can deliver all kinds of content – live TV, catch-up, consolequality games and so on – without the need to have a host of boxes plugged in. It would also stream content from other devices regardless of manufacturer, and be relatively future-proof to ensure compatibility with new content services. Right now, connected TVs come with some, but not all, live TV, some streaming services and not others, no console-quality gaming and will only play nicely with the right wireless device. There are too many competing manufacturers and content providers for anyone to be able to build such a thing, and so we’ll carry on attaching boxes to our infrequently upgraded TVs.
Business Technology · August 2014
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Connected TV
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Tech standards being ironed out STANDARDS are being developed to make sure industry players can cope technically with the explosion in demand for connected TV. Simon Gauntlett (right), CTO at Digital TV Group (DTG), says: “Broadcasting is still the most efficient way of delivering content, but being connected is the most efficient way to find what you want and watch shows when not everyone else is. A lot is happening in the UK – we are trying to nurture technology and ensure it is aligned with international bodies.”
The DTG was formed in 1995 by UK TV groups such as BBC, BskyB, ITV and Channel 4 to set technical standards for digital TV. “The technologies of mobile and Wi-Fi have revolutionised the world we live in,” says Gauntlett. “Broadband has become an essential utility service. Consumer expectations are driving demand for connected TV and they expect to get whatever content they want, wherever they are. “Customers are demanding much higher quality and more immersive experiences. Obviously we have been
through digital, HD and 3D and now we are looking at ultra high-definition television and virtual reality.” Although there is high demand for content to be delivered to different devices, there are still many technical challenges to face. “There is a lot of innovation that goes on in the UK, particularly driven by the likes of BBC, Sky, Virgin Media and others. Having an agreed core standard allows a common playing field,” says Gauntlett. “The main things are around web standards for television.
It is agreeing what the profile of an internet-connected TV is and how to ensure service providers can deliver something [that looks and behaves the same way] to get that interoperability. “When the broadcast and broadband industries first came together, it felt like they were talking different languages. They had different ways of doing things. Most of our effort is trying to get everyone to the
same place, to a level where they can all sit on a core platform. That is what we are doing. Then the industry can innovate on top of that. “There are standards already in place but what we are seeing at the moment is a lot of fragmentation in the market, where everyone is trying to innovate individually, and that is causing quite a lot of consumer confusion. You get different core services from different devices.”
Sir Michael cooks up a treat By Joanne Frearson
SIR MICHAEL Parkinson, the TV personality famous for his late-night chat shows, has been working with Waitrose o n l i n e fo o d c h a n n e l s , giving viewers a culinary experience – accompanied by sparkling conversation – over the internet. Sir Michael has been cooking up gastronomic feasts with top chefs such as Heston Blumenthal, Angela Hartnett and Mary Berry in a series of interviews specially designed for the web. Waitrose says it wants to inspire its customers to think about food in different ways and encourage them to try something they would not normally consider. The retailer hopes to engage with a new audience that might not necessarily come into its stores and the strategy is paying off, as Waitrose is receiving about two million views a month for its digital content. So why did the supermarket approach the king of the chat shows in particular? “Sir Michael Parkinson is a great fit for our brand,” explains Rupert Ellwood, head of marketing
Sir Michael Parkinson – with chef Mary Berry – is the new face of Waitrose’s online food channel
Net TV now the norm for Generation Y SUGGESTING TV could be connected through the internet a few years ago might have got you laughed at, but today it has become an accepted way of doing things, especially for Generation Y. Lloyd Klarke, director of product management at Roku, says the younger generation do not think about broadcast versus streaming versus satellite – they think of TV as what they watch on their tablet or on their big screen. “People are certainly changing how they watch things with the availability of on demand video,” he says. “They are using catch-up services for things that they have missed. The catchphrases
bubbling to the top are ‘binge’ or ‘marathon’ watching. It is where you get into one show and you have to watch the next one and the next.” Klarke sees content and platforms as the main drivers in the development of connected TV. “We are seeing a couple of main trends,” he says. “The first is content. There are more catch-up services and there are more and more new videos and entertainment services that have been designed specifically for streaming. “The other main thing that is driving business is new platforms. The first is standalone devices such as box or stick
format. The other is smart TVs. There has been a shift for streaming to be the centre point of how the television operates.” One of the difficulties for industry players is in making the navigation systems on these devices easy to use. As Klarke says: “It is difficult to help someone get to the thing that they want to watch. We know when people get to their sofa at night all they really want to do is watch something. They do not want to spend a lot of time looking for a channel or a lot of time in the interface of the product. They just want to get to the thing they want to watch and watch it.”
communications at Waitrose. “We were keen to make that connection with some of the top chefs, hence the reason we got him on board. Using an iconic presenter like that was brilliant for helping us get the message out there. “ It h a s b e e n r e a l l y successful. It is all part of our overall content strategy. It was an iconic set of interviews which had never been done before by a retailer. It is something different. We love to do something different from our competitors.” Ellwood adds: “We are quite careful to make sure all our content has got real credibility editorially. What we don’t want to do is create content that is overtly branded. Quite often when you see some of our content, you will not even see our branding. That is quite
important. Consumers are really savvy and they know when they are being sold to. Consumers do not want to be compromised when they are reading content or consuming content.” Ellwood says a big focus for Waitrose is “creating our own content”. It is also creating shows on terrestrial TV as a part of its marketing strategy along with internet TV, and Ellwood does not have a bias towards one or the other. “Terrestrial TV still has the biggest viewing in numbers,” he says. “But our strategy here is we know that our consumers love content and when they engage through our digital channels that level of engagement is perhaps deeper and more connected than it is necessarily when you do TV advertising. But they are both incredibly important.”
Business Technology · August 2014
Connected TV
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Industry leaders come together to offer an end-to-end CaaS service that eliminates complexity Putting a multiplatform video offering within reach for any service provider Enter Content-as-a-Service (CaaS)
INDUSTRY VIEW
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s “TV Everywhere” becomes a must-have for the subscriber, how can service providers stand up a strong service that delivers the best subscriber experience quickly and cost-effectively? There is no doubt consumers want and expect to access content on any device – at any time. “Binge viewing” – watching two or more episodes of the same TV show in one sitting – along with the proliferation of more and more quality television programming, has resulted in people watching more TV than ever before. And increasingly, consumers are augmenting traditional TV viewing with video streamed to computers and mobile devices. Whether it’s on TV, a tablet, a smartphone or a computer, a range of service provider types – traditional cable companies, mobile and wire-line carriers, retailers, OTT video players (such as Netflix), distributors and content companies – all know they need to develop smart strategies and easy-to-access services that deliver high-demand content to consumers. And yet, developing and launching a
multiplatform or TV Everywhere offering is not easy. Licensing content and negotiating rights is not only difficult, confusing and time-consuming – it is also expensive. Licensing costs can run anywhere from 50 to 70 per cent of revenue. Further, operators must manage an ever-increasing array of device and DRM (digital rights management) formats, requiring them to create, store and distribute as many as 20 versions of each title, or more. And then they must continually update the profiles and formats as new devices are introduced. All of this translates to high transcoding and storage costs, along with the capital it takes for infrastructure investments and to build out virtual storefronts, an e-commerce back-end and DRM systems. Also, the service provider needs to select, deploy and manage the content delivery infrastructure to stream all that multiplatform video and make sure they can reach subscribers regardless of the network to which they are connecting. Suddenly, for operators in smaller markets, launching a TV Everywhere service can seem out of reach. And even for larger players, the task can seem daunting.
Content-as-a-Service is a simple concept: as complexity in the digital IP video ecosystem increases, it makes sense for service providers and content owners to consider outsourcing the management of the content supply chain to a third party that can leverage economies of scale and deliver a consumer-grade service at a reasonable cost. This allows service providers to focus on their core competencies and spend their resources and budgets on their networks, developing new offerings, technology and customer service. Much as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) changed the game for business software, by eliminating the need to manage licences, upgrades and other tedious aspects of an IT infrastructure, CaaS delivers all the processes necessary to develop, launch and manage a consumer-facing TV Everywhere solution. Like its software-focused predecessor, CaaS distributes the costs of infrastructure across multiple service providers, reducing capital expenditures, offering a “pay-as-you-go” model that allows the service provider to pay only for what they use, and allows for almostimmediate ramp-up and launch. Two industry leaders – Akamai and Vubiquity – have come together to offer an end-to-end CaaS service that eliminates the complexities, and puts launching a multiplatform video offering within reach for any service provider. Akamai operates the world’s largest distributed cloud services platform and is a market leader in delivery of multiplatform IP Video. The Akamai Intelligent Platform™ is a global platform with 150,000 servers deployed on more than 1,200 networks in 92 countries. In addition, the company’s Aura Licensed and Managed CDN solutions give service providers the deployment flexibility, control, and scale that they have become accustomed to when delivering highquality live or on-demand video streams. Vubiquity is the leading provider of multiplatform video services. The company’s AnyVU Cloud platform was built upon Vubiquity’s experience working with content owners, cable operators, IPTV operators and OTT players in 37 countries and opens up multiplatform video capabilities to any type of service provider. It offers a broad set of modular services that include a deep library of licensed content, a digital storefront, and directto-subscriber streaming, electronic sell-through (EST) as well as other next-generation video services.
Together, they are introducing Content-as-a-Service – powerful, scalable and cost-effective services that enable TV Everywhere without the complexity of managing the various elements of content preparation and delivery. With CaaS, service providers can access a pre-configured content library from the cloud and pay only for what they use. Because the cost of content, storage, encoding, as well as managing and maintaining device and format profiles is shared across multiple customers, CaaS changes the traditional model, offering content at a much more competitive price so that service providers can offer the libraries they need to satisfy their customers. A global platform also makes it far more cost-effective to deliver content anywhere in the world. For example, in markets with a large ex-pat community, a Pay-TV operator might want to offer content in that community’s language. Rather than acquiring, coding and locally storing that content, with CaaS they can access it from a server in the country of origin, and stream it directly to their subscribers. CaaS simplifies the infrastructure required to stream digital video to any IP device while lowering the costs to open up a virtually unlimited world of new monetisation and service opportunities. Suddenly, service providers can package and market a broad range of services to new types of customers by augmenting their core offerings with a subscription movies service: transaction-driven on-demand access to catch-up TV, first-run movies, download-to-play and download-to-own services that allow subscribers to watch movies whether they are physically connected to the internet or not. Vubiquity’s long-standing relationships with studios, networks and content providers, and extensive experience managing video-ondemand services for their service provider customers, combined with Akamai’s massive global network and leadership in the delivery of IP video content have come together to offer everything an operator needs to quickly and cost-effectively launch a multiplatform video service. Steven Chester is vice president, global media & entertainment, Akamai Anupam Gupta is EVP, cloud services, Vubiquity +1 818 526 5000 www.vubiquity.com www.akamai.com/html/industry/ media_entertainment.html
Business Technology · August 2014
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Connected TV
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Getting on the Tube When it comes to getting your brand across, going viral is the marketer’s holy grail. Dave Baxter talks to the experts…
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S WITH radio and cinema before it, television has found its dominance being challenged. People may watch channels and catch up with shows online, but alternatives are clamouring for their attention too. Millions of people watch and share videos online, from iconic Christmas adverts to clips of Charlie, a baby, biting his brother’s finger, and even Japanese politicians crying. These, given the right push, can sweep across the internet in a short time. For marketers and advertisers, “going viral” is one mark of a campaign’s success when it comes to reaching, and potentially influencing, consumers. But achieving this – and measuring it – could be less straightforward than some imagine. One person visibly excited about all of this is Sarah Wood, who is sitting in a room at the top of her east London offices – which, she tells me, used to be a toy factory – enjoying the sound of the rain dashing against the building. Wood has been in the midst of the world of shareable video for some time. Unruly, the marketing technology firm she co-founded, has been focusing on getting videos watched and shared, as well as tracking their progress, since 2006. Wood’s enthusiasm is palpable, and contagious, and it’s not long before she launches into a brief summary of the industry’s development, and the rise of branded video. “Back in 2006, viral was in an experimental early stage and brands would have a small budget behind bits of content,”
she says. “Now we are seeing a conversion, and we see a more holistic approach. “We have seen an explosion in people sharing branded content. You think of examples like the Dove Real Beauty campaign, which had millions of shares. We have seen more brands putting digital views at the heart of their visual campaigns.” She notes that shareable video could be the next medium with the power to engage individuals. “We found that video was the medium that had the power to bring that combination of image and sound,” she says. “I think that video can engage an audience in a way that others mediums can’t. Think of cinema and then television in the 20th century. “Sometimes with written content, a headline distorts a story. You can’t distort a video. Images can also be used to capture the essence of a story – think of Instagram and Vine.” And Wood is not the only one who’s enthusiastic about this. Keen to engage consumers across social media such as Facebook and Twitter, companies have been piling in with their own videos aimed at harnessing people’s emotions, from shocking them to pulling at their heartstrings. Wood notes that, with this shift, the industry has become more cluttered, but also warns that spending money alone will not guarantee success. “Before, people were saying ‘Why do we care about shares?’” she says. “Now, the space is more cluttered because brands are creating more content, and people have to work much harder. The quality of content has increased. When I talk about the quality of content, I’m not talking about production values and budgets. People don’t care if it has high-quality cameras and high definition. They want a strong emotional connection. It’s about giving them the reason to share it, whether it’s inspiring them or shocking them. These are the psychological triggers.” This can mean appealing to how people feel, in both a positive and negative sense. In some cases it can even mean deliberately offending consumers – though Wood warns that this could be a risky strategy. “There are risks of offending people,” she says. “Brands need to be confident in who they are and what they stand for. This is why the brand authority is important. “You need to know your brand and understand your brand and know your audience. You also need to know at what points you feel comfortable alienating and offending the general public. It’s a dangerous strategy and one where you should consider who your audience is.” Past the content itself, Wood sees further change in the world of video. For Unruly, which employs around 150 people, 2014 has been a year of aggressive expansion. In March the company opened an office in Singapore, where video advertising spending is predicted to have a compound annual growth rate of 37.5 per cent. Beyond London, it has offices in major cities including New York, Hamburg and Paris. The battle for viral content is being fought across different continents, but also across multiple platforms and devices. This, and the variety of metrics available, can make it hard to measure success. Wood says: “There are tablets and mobiles and it’s harder for lots of people to measure what’s going on. There are many different types of shares.”
Dove’s Real Beauty video (below left) was shared by customers, as was Unruly’s own campaign for Heineken, The Entrance (right); below: Unruly co-founder Sarah Wood
Apart from her industry, Wood is also passionate about the technology scene, particularly in London. But she is not convinced by concerns of a technology bubble forming in the capital – though she worries about British scepticism. She says: “People ask whether there is a bubble, but what I see is a maturing market. What we see now is a move from the start-up to the scale-up, though you still have companies that want to start up. “We have people that are committed to building and delivering real technology, but I think we are more grounded in reality. That’s not always for the best. “The Americans will embrace a dream. In London, investors and the press are often far more realistic. There are certain moments when that can be helpful and keep us focused, and times when it doesn’t help.” Wood, at least, seems charged with optimism for the future. The former toy factory and its occupants have lots in store.
Business Technology · August 2014
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VIEW By Keil Hubert
ExpertInsight
I HEARD that y’all are getting a new season of Red Dwarf sometime this year. Specifically, I heard it in the middle of the night from one of my mates when the announcement was first leaked. Eduardo is an unrepentant Red Dwarf fan and was so giddy at the prospect of another season that he woke me up at 3am to share the news. That’s probably why I got tetchy with him and reminded him that he’d never get to see the new season here in the USA, since his favourite show has never (for whatever reason) been broadcast over here. That’s an annoyance that a “smart” television can’t solve. My family has more content access devices than we have screens in the house, including two Apple TV pods, a Google Chromecast pod, a DVR, and two digital cable TV controllers. Heck, even our PlayStation and DVD player have the Netflix and Hulu television service apps loaded on them. The only reason that we have all of these gadgets is to get access to television content, since no two devices can access all of the shows that we want to see. I can see Game Of Thrones over our cable service, but our cable company flatly refuses to let us stream it with HBO’s app. I can get Top Gear and Orphan Black via cable as well, but only by paying them triple for an expanded channel
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Don’t make us copyright criminals – just give us the shows we want package. If I want to see Attack On Titan, I can only get it through my Netflix subscription. Until recently, the only way that I could see an Al Jazeera newscast was to stream it from the channel’s website. To really add insult to injury, the only way to watch Channel 4’s 10 O’Clock Live has been to fly to the UK and then stream it from channel4.com. A modern television set is smart enough to display darned near anything that we can feed it, from analog to HD, from American to Japanese, and everything in between. It used to be that if you wanted to watch an Americanonly TV show on your British TV (or vice versa), you had to buy an illegal bootleg copy, or invest in a u n i ve r s a l VC R . We’ve done away w it h t he dev ice incompatibility problem by addressing
broadcast formats with smarter software-based player apps. We should be able to see everything from all over the world without difficulty. We can’t, though, and that’s deliberate. This is the future of connected TV, folks – an everincreasing number of commercial aggregators that force us all to pay them exorbitant fees to access their incomplete and overlapping collections of content. It’s infuriating. Eventually, if this trend continues, TVs and PCs alike will sport an iTunes-like interface where we’re told to purchase each episode of each show that we want to see, each time that we want to see it. It’s the vending machine future for us. That, or we come full-circle back to the bootleg approach. A lot of otherwise-regular citizens are giving up on traditional television entirely and have started pirating content. There’s a good reason why the finale to season four of HBO’s Game Of Thrones was the most pirated television show ever. Game Of Thrones is great content, but it’s restricted and expensive. Viewers are exhausted from all of the unnecessary, burdensome, and extortionist hoops that they have to jump through just to watch a single hour of television. In June, seven and a half million people said “I give up” and became copyright criminals... for a TV show. That’s not the future that anyone wants.
TV Everywhere: from experimentation to expectation and execution INDUSTRY VIEW
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he 2014 Sochi Games marked a shift in viewer expectations of multiscreen TV Everywhere, and in the IP delivery of live and linear TV programmes. Consumer experimentation yielded to expectations of performance and engagement. Technology experiments among broadcasters and pay-TV providers yielded to real investments in IP delivery and monetisation of TV content across connected screens. In many cases, upstart video businesses yielded to established companies with the scale, resources, and capacity necessary for delivering live events to massive concurrent audiences with the stability and reliability of traditional broadcast TV. Historically, watching television content on a mobile device – particularly live and linear programming – was frustrating, with playback errors and redundant advertising creating a less-thansatisfying viewing experience. Prior to 2014, media companies were in an experimental phase, testing different technologies and partnerships for
multiscreen delivery, while holding tightly to the existing business models that have historically made television profitable. Data from the Sochi Games highlighted how quickly and enthusiastically viewers were embracing mobile and desktop TV viewing as a genuine alternative, or supplement, to traditional linear delivery. More than 25m viewers watched NBC’s digital broadcast of the Winter Games on desktops and devices, with the US vs Canada men’s hockey game garnering an audience of more than 2.1m viewers. The BBC’s broadcast television coverage of Andy Murray’s Wimbledon victory in 2013 drew a peak audience of more than 17m viewers – one of the largest TV audiences for a live sporting event in UK history – with device consumption a footnote. One year later, ESPN’s coverage of the Argentina-Germany FIFA World Cup final match drew an audience of more than 1.8m on digital devices alone. Admittedly, this apples-to-oranges comparison ignores differences in consumption patterns across borders, among other factors, but the larger point is that viewers are watching more television on more devices – a trend that bodes well for broadcasters and pay-TV
providers, and for advertisers wishing to marry the reach of television with the personalisation of digital. Perhaps most importantly, according to a recent report from Needham, TV Everywhere is boosting linear tune-in: ESPN’s multidevice FIFA World Cup delivery added 12 per cent to its TV audience. Rather than cannibalising its core TV business, ESPN is growing its traditional linear TV audience by creating great viewing experiences on devices. Not every live broadcast in 2014 has been a success. TV Everywhere coverage of the Academy Awards in the US and certain World Cup matches in the UK experienced major outages. Both cases are examples of broadcasters failing to scale adequately to meet consumer expectations for multiscreen TV.
As broadcasters and pay-TV providers seize the opportunities that TV Everywhere presents, and monetise content through dynamic ad insertion and subscriptions more efficiently, established companies such as Adobe are creating measureable value for customers. The technology providers that will thrive in this new environment are the ones helping media companies achieve real results and efficiencies by providing the flexibility, scale and capacity required to meet viewers’ expectations for live, linear and ondemand TV across desktops and devices. Campbell Foster (left) is director of product marketing, Adobe Primetime blogs.adobe.com/primetime
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The inner geek
Moz & Bradders
On-demand TV networks challenging terrestrials By Joanne Frearson
INTERNET television networks such as Netflix are challenging the traditional broadcasting business model by allowing consumers to be able to view exclusive content whenever and wherever they want. With popular shows such as Breaking Bad and Arrested Development on its books, Netflix has grown to 48 million members in more than 40 countries since launching in 2007, enjoying more than one billion hours of TV shows and movies per month. Dr Stephanie Feiereisen, senior lecturer in marketing at Cass Business School, part of City University London, says: “There are a few things that explain Netflix’s success – one is that it tests a lot. Netflix is always trying out new concepts. It is not afraid of innovating and promoting creativity within the company. “Netflix also focuses on the user experience and makes sure its service is affordable for consumers. But one of the most important things is that it has the ability to be future-thinking and recognise change.”
Breaking Bad has been one of Netflix’s success stories; below right: Stephanie Feiereisen of London’s Cass Business School
By investing in original content such as House Of Cards and Orange Is The New Black, Feiereisen believes Netflix is challenging the way traditional broadcasters operate. She says: “Television as we know it does not represent the future. Netflix is much more
what the future stands for. Normally when they launch a new series, broadcasters show one episode per week and consumers have to wait for each. What Netflix did was start with House Of Cards and release all the episodes of the first season all together. “This is saying to consumers, we know what you want and it is going to be up to you when you watch it. You can either watch them once in a while or you can watch all of these episodes in a row. It is transforming the industry.” Starring Kevin Spacey, House Of Cards – the US remake of the 1990 British series
– became the first online TV show to receive major Emmy nominations. In its first season, it received nine Emmy Award nominations, winning 13 in its second. Careful data analysis has played a big part in Netflix’s success in investing in original content. The company focuses on being able to understand what type of shows its customers want to watch. “Netflix already knew with House Of Cards, that its viewers had been streaming things with Kevin Spacey in,” Feiereisen says. “The British version of House Of Cards had been popular and the director had also been successful on Netflix. They knew by combining these three, they were likely to have a very successful series.”
Connected TV
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Business Technology · August 2014
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Connected TV
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You’ll never w The global game: how Liverpool make sure they connect with their fans around the world
Greetings Washingt f on
Greetings from Kiev! Greetings from Tokyo!
Conference 11 - 15 September Exhibition 12 - 16 September RAI Amsterdam
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Greetings from Reykjavik! By Joanne Frearson
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IVERPOOL, under the impressive management of Brendan Rodgers, will run out to take on Southampton this afternoon in their opening match of the Barclays Premier League season with the eyes of the world on them. The club, which finished second behind Manchester City last May – and came close to winning the league – might be without Luis Suárez, but they will not be lacking support. As well as the 45,000 or so fans who will be packed into Anfield, there could be a worldwide audience of up to 500 million. Football truly is the global game. Football clubs who used just to worry about providing a meat pie and a mug of Bovril for their fans at half-time now use all the communications technology available to make sure they are engaging with fans from Australia to Argentina and from India to Indiana. And Liverpool do not have to rely on TV companies to create all the interest – they can generate a lot of it themselves. The club have a full seven-day-a-week TV channel and a weekly three-hour TV show that reaches 100 million homes across 94 countries. They also have no fewer than 28 different official social media accounts worldwide, and have recently launched their first local-language official website in Indonesia. Paul Rogers, head of international digital development at Liverpool FC, tells me how the
club have undergone a digital transformation over the past few years to be able to deliver content to fans all over the world. Proud of his club achievements both in football and in the digital space, Rogers excitedly tells me about Liverpool’s greatest ever night – winning the Champions League in 2005 – and how the world has become so much more connected since then. He says: “The landscape for content and what we did that night is completely different to where we are nine years later. We were not on Facebook, we were not on Twitter, we were not on YouTube, we did not have a television channel… how people consume content is very different today. “How we communicate, how we interact and engage with millions of our supporters is really, really important. It is changing all the time and constantly evolving.” Liverpool’s strategy to be more connected over the years has evolved to use a more localised approach for each country they broadcast to. The club have fans in all areas of the world, such as Indonesia, Thailand, the Middle East and Brazil, who do not have English as their first language. In order to keep them engaged, the club provide content to these fans in their own language and make their broadcasts local to the area. But it was only recently the club decided to use this strategy. In November 2012 they were still communicating
Above: Liverpool coach Brendan Rodgers being filmed during the club’s 3-0 victory at Manchester United last season; below: Paul Rogers
to their 500 million fan-base solely in English. “What we found was there was obviously a massive barrier in terms of language,” says Rogers. “There was also a barrier to having content localised to that market. What a fan wants to know in India or America might be different from what a fan wants to know in the UK. “It is about what content fans want to consume. Do they want every single detail about Liverpool, or do they want a bit more celebrity focused? When will the content go out, what is the length of the content, what is the ultimate length of a video, how long will people watch a video? Are they used to paying for content on video? I would say that market is not really there in Thailand, where it is in America or it is in the UK. It has become now quite common for people to pay for Netflix or pay for different sorts of online subscription. “People are quite comfortable about putting credit card details online. [But] I do not really think that is the case for lots of places in Asia. Piracy is rife as well. How do you compete
Business Technology · August 2014
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Connected TV
watch alone
from n DC!
gs n i t e e Gr elhi! D m o r f
with piracy? One way is competing head to head – instead of charging people you will try to deliver a better service to what is being pirated, by taking a sponsorship route rather than direct consumer transactions.” What helps when making a commercial deal is to be able to tell the local broadcasters, Rogers explains, that they are engaging with fans locally. “We are doing a lot more localised TV – if we are making a show in America, we will use an American presenter,” he says. “In Indonesia we have an Indonesian presenter. It is about deliver ing content that is localised. Even in Malaysia, where English is predominantly spoken, we will still use a Malaysian presenter as the viewers will identify with that a lot more than a one-size-fits-all English presenter.” This strategy is paying off for Liverpool in countries where the club have localised content, Rogers says. “We have seen revenue per fan double in some of those places. Then you look at countries where we have no localised content at all – we are not seeing those sorts of trends. The more we localise the better we will see on a retail level.”
Rogers’ ultimate goal is for Liverpool to be able to communicate and engage their fans no matter where they live and what language they speak. He says: “We can’t guarantee we will win every week, no football club can, but how do we keep the fans when we do not do so well? By engaging them and making them feel part of the club. “It is about how you strengthen the bond, how do you bring millions of fans around the world closer to the football club they support. We are the means of trying to connect them with what they love and what they are passionate about.” A pie and a mug of Bovril might still warm the bones on a cold night for many British fans standing outside watching football, but a Liverpool supporter can be connected to the game wherever they might be in the world through the wonders of digital technology.
Greetings from Paris!
Greetings from LA!
ExpertInsight
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9
Innovative vision of the future of broadcasting INDUSTRY VIEW
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rqiva, the communications infrastructure and media services company operating at the heart of the broadcast, satellite and mobile communications markets, is embarking on an industry-wide programme of discovery into the future of broadcasting. Given the exponential growth of connected devices, from smartphones to tablets and connected TVs, consumers now expect seamless, uninterrupted broadcast quality access to content anywhere and anytime. But the question remains; how can broadcasters meet their responsibility to provide and deliver? The broadcasting industry is almost at the tipping point, where success depends on the consolidation of TV platforms, multiple technologies, devices and business models, to deliver broadcast-grade content wherever and whenever consumers want it. Arqiva calls this consolidated platform Connected Broadcasting. The study, commissioned by Arqiva and conducted by Decipher, the media strategy and research company, will explore changing consumer demands, the new technological landscape and will seek to clarify the needs and expectations of media businesses, identify potential new TV entrants and opportunities for existing players. Connected Broadcasting will build a picture of the media world, its technological possibilities and market dynamics, through a series of think tanks, quantitative and qualitative research, one-to-one interviews, live panel debates and white papers. For the industry to deliver truly Connected Broadcasting services, processes must be designed for television which combine the best of traditional workflow efficiency and reliability, together with reach, scalability and dynamic operations to deliver end-to-end to all consumer devices. The Arqiva study will draw together the brightest minds in the industry and seek to guide broadcasters, content owners, studios, platform owners, technology partners and brands though the rapidly evolving TV ecosystem. For more information or to get involved: connectedbroadcasting.com
Business Technology 路 August 2014
10
Connected TV
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Connected TV
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Inspector Dogberry Being a huge football fan – at least, every four years – Dogberry has been getting connected during the World Cup in Brazil by watching it on his laptop. He was pleased to hear that this is becoming a very popular way to view events, with the BBC reporting its summer of sport has broken digital records already. From the start of the World Cup in Brazil until the end of The Open
Championship, a total of 96 million unique browsers accessed BBC Sport across PCs, tablets, mobiles and connected TVs. The first full week of the World Cup (16–22 June) also set the new UK weekly mobile reach record of 8.1m unique browsers. The BBC received around 25m live video requests over this period. The majority of these requests
ExpertInsight
Controversial Republican firebrand Sarah Palin has launched a subscription-based online TV channel, which will give users thoughts about various issues in the world as well as provide solutions. Subscription can either be on a monthly plan for $9.95, or an annual plan at $99.95. The channel can be watched on web-enabled laptops, smartphones and tablets, and will soon launch on online streaming service Roku. Palin was Governor of Alaska from 2006 to 2009 before serving as John McCain’s running mate in his presidential campaign in August 2008. She is a contributor for FOX News, where she offers political commentary and analysis across all FOX News platforms and is also the author of best-selling books Going Rogue and America By Heart.
were a result of people wanting to view footage from the World Cup. This event received 15.9m requests, Wimbledon was also popular with 8.1m, while The Open received 1.5m and British Grand Prix had 369k. Chris Condron, head of product for BBC Sport, says: “We’ve been evolving our technology to provide live digital coverage across any device since London 2012, focusing on what audiences really want: their choice of the BBC’s best live TV, radio and text content from major events at their fingertips.”
Freeview and Digital UK have announced a fiveyear plan to develop a new Freeview-branded connected TV service. The new offer will give viewers easy access to both broadcast and ondemand TV, including a range of popular catch-up players. A dedicated team has been set up to develop the service, working in co-operation with manufacturers and industry bodies and based on open standards. The aim will be for manufacturers to launch a new range of connected Freeview HD televisions and boxes which people will be able to watch via aerial and broadband provider without being tied to a contract.
Hammer time Internet streaming service NOW TV is available to all PlayStation 4 users offering them instant access to Sky Movies, Sky Sports and TV shows. Users can get unlimited access to the very latest films including Gravity, Thor: The Dark World and Captain Phillips, while the NOW TV Entertainment Month Pass includes Silicon Valley, Got To Dance and Scandal. Sports fans can keep up with the biggest games and events with the Sky Sports Day Pass, which covers the Barclays Premier League, the Football League season, the UEFA Super Cup, the PGA Championship, the US Open, Formula 1 and the Ryder Cup in September.
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By Matt Smith, web editor
u Editor’s pick YuMe Connected TV www.yume.com/blog/category/ connected-tv The Connected TV section on YuMe’s blog features updates and insights on everything from ad revenue to the latest enhanced television sets on the market, along with analysis of statistics comparing traditional TV to connected TV. Also, take a look at the main site for more on apps, mobile and advertising.
Econsultancy Connected TV
Adobe Primetime Blog
econsultancy.com/blog/tags/ connected-tv
blogs.adobe.com/primetime
This section of the Econsultancy website lends interesting viewpoints on connected TV and related trends and technologies, including the rise of social TV, how successes can be transferred to new platforms, and how brands can take greater advantage of the second screen phenomenon.
Adobe’s team offers insights and updates on TV delivery and monetisation. Recent posts include new statistics that show a dramatic increase in online TV consumption, a review of Sochi – the most-watched digital Winter Olympics in history – and a look at the technology behind your connected TV experience.
The Stevie Blog blog.stevie.com
Beamly (FREE – Android/iOS)
Xbox One SmartGlass (FREE – Android/iOS)
Expand your TV experience with this app, which combines a TV guide and social media, and can also be used as a remote control.
This excellent example of second-screen integration enables you to control an Xbox One from mobile devices.
For a more light-hearted perspective on the future of TV take a look at The Stevie Blog. Run by the developers of a platform that turns the social web into TV programming, the site details the best socialinspired streams and discusses how TV will develop as apps make their way to our sets.
Getting broadcasters and content companies better connected INDUSTRY VIEW
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oday’s audiences take it for granted that they can get the content they want, when and where they want it, whether it’s a live football match, on-demand movie, news bulletin, TV series or radio programme. The global audience now demands instant, smooth access on the device of their choice, meaning connected platforms now need the same focus on quality as terrestrial broadcasting. To meet these expectations, content owners must negotiate a constantly-shifting maze of technologies, formats and delivery mechanisms and keep track of quality across potentially hundreds of different devices. Outsourcing content distribution allows companies to focus on making great content, but a fragmented and commoditised approach using multiple technology providers is not enough. The content owner or
publisher needs to be confident that their content will reach their audience – every time, on every device. Babcock International Group’s media services business has a long history of broadcast service management, and we apply the same quality standards across our whole range of flexible media services: from TV channel playout to satellite uplink; from encoding live and on-demand video for internet distribution to installing and operating radio transmitters in remote parts of the world. Our 24/7/365 Media Management Centre is a fully-resilient early-warning system. It’s equipped to continuously monitor “off-air” and “off-web” output on the same wide range of devices today’s audiences are using: satellite or cable TV, PC or Mac, connected TVs or games consoles, iOS or Android handsets and even OTT boxes like Apple TV or Roku. And with clients like the BBC, NHK, Deutsche Welle and Voice of America,
our team of engineering and content management specialists is used to meeting high standards. With today’s audiences expecting the same level of quality on every device, Babcock ensures that broadcasters and content companies get better connected. Richard Jacobs is business development director, media services at Babcock International Group richard.jacobs@babcockinternational.com
Business Technology · August 2014
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Connected TV
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Viewers switching to on-demand content By Joanne Frearson
THE USE OF PCs, laptops, tablets and mobiles to watch TV is increasing worldwide, according to a study on Connected Life by advisory firm TNS. A quarter of people surveyed worldwide watch content on a PC, laptop, tablet or mobile daily. This rises to 33 per cent in mainland China and Singapore and 32 per cent in Hong Kong, where smaller tablets, or “phablets”, are increasingly popular. In Hong Kong, more people choose to watch TV and video online rather than on traditional sets. After dinner 26 per cent tune into content on their digital devices, in contrast to 14 per cent who switch on their TVs. Matthew Froggatt, chief
development officer at TNS, says: “In a world where multi-tasking is the norm, the context in which we watch TV is rapidly changing – it isn’t just on the sofa at home with no other digital distractions around us. Instead, the growth in screen-stacking and online TV viewing is huge, particularly in the Asian markets, driven by a growing demand for content among viewers. “While there is no disputing our love of traditional TV, advertisers must continue to adapt to our changing viewing habits. Online devices offer more ways to access TV and video content, meaning brands will need to adopt a more integrated online approach to engage consumers.” The survey found that almost half of people who watch TV in the evening simultaneously engage in other digital activities, such as using social media, checking emails or shopping online. It also found that participants owned on average four digital devices each, rising to five among Australian, German and UK respondents. This, combined with demand for video content onthe-go, is fuelling the rise of “screen-stacking” – the use of multiple digital devices at the same time.
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Anthony Rose tells Joanne Frearson how a childhood blowing up radios inspired him…
W
ExpertInsight
HEN I was still at school I started my own business making and selling electronics. Ever since I blew up the family radio and had to be rushed to hospital with blackened hands, somehow I loved electronics,” Anthony Rose, co-founder and CTO of Beamly tells me. “When I got tired of getting blown up I got into software. I love creating products which people love and use, I love working with smart tech people.” Rose, pictured right, comes across as a man who clearly loves his gadgets, and being blown up in childhood certainly didn’t deter him from a career in technology. He was responsible for designing the BBC iPlayer, and his latest venture is social TV app Beamly, which he cofounded with ex-EMI board director Ernesto Schmitt. “In the future anyone can be a broadcaster,” says Rose, a selfdescribed connected TV technologist. “Your television will not just play video, it will be a news feed. You will not just leave your TV on while you are watching television – your TV will be a 24-hour window to the world.
Rose’s new product, Beamly, very much connects TV users together. First launched in 2011 under the name Zeebox, it was rebranded in April to become a 24/7 proposition of news, gossip and social TV room community. Available on iPhone, iPad, Android and the web, the app allows users to interact live with their favourite shows via custom play, online games and contextual votes, which are all synched live to what’s on screen. It provides a companion experience for audiences while watching television. “Your TV, for example – as you walk towards it with your mobile phone in your pocket, it will say, ‘hello Anthony’, because it knows from your mobile phone being nearby that you are now in front of it. “The future will be your phone, which is with you all the time – you will figure out fun things to watch, who you will watch it with and sometimes you will watch it on your phone and sometimes you will send the picture to your TV screen.” He s ay s: “ B ea m ly enables new ways of finding things to watch, new ways of chatting with fans of the
show while you are watching and always being part of the show themselves.” Since Beamly launched three months ago, its usage has rocketed. The app has three million active members, and the demographic user profile has shifted from geeky males to a younger female audience. When Zeebox first started it was more focused towards being a TV guide and emerged, says Rose, as a “quite geeky male proposition – people loved it, but they did not tell their friends. We sought to enhance the proposition, so it wasn’t something you watched and used while you were just watching TV. You could dip into it during the day, be in the office and wanting to catch up on the latest Corrie news and gossip. “Where Beamly is resonating is most with soaps and reality TV, anything from TOWIE, Coronation Street, The Voice – shows where you can vote and be part of it are popular.” Rose believes social TV is a combination of participating in a show, voting and talking to other people and getting information. “It will be rare that you will be watching TV alone while millions of other people watch alone disconnected from each other. That world is changing,” he says. “In the future you will watch when and where you want – you will be connected with news, gossip and stories at your fingers at any time of the day. Whenever you want to watch, you
push a button and it will play on your phone – or if you are near a big telly, it will play even better and brighter and in higher definition.” To keep its members engaged, Beamly has an agile development team – every few weeks it tries to bring out product enhancements and in the longer term Rose expects the app will be built into TV sets. Gone are the days where Rose is being rushed to hospital from mishaps in his electronic projects – instead he is busy making TV a more social and connected experience.
Ultra HD, 4K, 8K and beyond – the evolution of broadcasting Bringing consumers the brilliant viewing experiences they crave INDUSTRY VIEW
T
he broadcasting industry is in an irreversible period of continuous change, propelled by the opportunities enabled by the latest mobile technologies and high-speed internet connectivity. Within years, today’s high-definition, ultra-high definition, 3D and 4K TVs will be superseded by as-yet unimagined technologies. Meanwhile, consumers are becoming more and more demanding when it comes to the way they consume different media. They want great, glitchfree viewing experiences, on any device, anytime, anywhere. They use connected TV, replay services and TV on demand. To keep up, the solution for broadcasters is clear – highbandwidth fibre connectivity and a service provider with the expertise to manage complex solutions. The most advanced ultra-high definition sets use a hundred times the bandwidth of standard TVs, so CIOs in the broadcasting industry must
increasingly adapt to such technological developments and associated bandwidth implications. For example, sport might be transmitted in the highest quality picture, whereas a lower quality might suffice for a local news bulletin. Interactivity is set to increase in TV programming too, whereby consumers are no longer passive viewers, but active participants through second screen applications. Due to the rapid evolution of the industry, a flexible, state-of-the-art fibre infrastructure is paramount. Yet managing such an infrastructure would be a huge undertaking for broadcasters. But this is just the first part: then we have different codecs and the increasing amount of data that is required to store this information; from a standard movie on DVD that is 3GB to a film in 4K that is between 60GB to 100GB. We are talking about petabytes of information. That’s why broadcasters will increasingly partner with service providers that deliver both a high-speed fibre network and the expertise needed to manage the codecs, compression
and latency as well as intelligent provisioning (play out/streaming) over the internet (use of external data centres and/or media-cloud). Broadcasters can then shift focus away from technology development and management to concentrate on what they do best – delivering great content and bringing consumers the brilliant viewing experiences they crave. This is why broadcasters are turning to companies like Colt. Colt’s vision
is to be the leading media network ring provider in Europe by providing a media services extranet allowing on-demand connectivity between all key media hub sites. It has already connected more than 80 key media hubs in Europe and serve 10 of the top 25 companies in the media sector clients. Edmund Cartwright is marketing director at Colt www.colt.net/media
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Connected TV Industry view
Business Zone
14 • Business Technology August 2014
The future We’ve seen the future and it’s spelt ‘Multiscreen‘
D
espite the popularity of HDTV and the positioning of 4K Ultra HD TV (UHD) for mass-market appeal, it’s become increasingly obvious that the enjoyment of all forms of video entertainment is no longer an activity relegated to the confines of one’s living room. A recent Google study revealed that the average user is quite willing to consume entertainment via whatever device is at hand, be it their smartphone, where more than 60 per cent of young viewers watch videos, their PC at work or their tablet. For content owners looking to maximise their revenues, the message is crystal clear: the future of entertainment consumption depends fully on a user’s ability to engage and interact with content across a wide variety of compatible devices. Faced with this reality, content owners would be wise to understand that a reliable multiscreen platform is the key to all future multiscreen services. Indeed, it seems obvious that the cornerstone of success will be the ability to serve audiences via all devices in all possible environments. That’s why my company, Visual Unity, offers its critically acclaimed vuMedia™ platform, which provides a fast and efficient way to experience video content across more than 10,000 devices. A recent Nielsen report claimed that the tendency of users to engage with an increasing amount of content over multiple media devices is growing rapidly. For example, 84 per cent of smartphone and tablet owners say they use their devices as second screens while watching TV at the
same time. Users polled also admitted to owning four digital devices on average while spending 60 hours a week consuming content across their respective devices. TV viewing is still the top choice for watching longer videos, but online and mobile viewing are where the growth is – 30 per cent growth in hours watched per month from the final quarter of 2012 to that of 2013. Meanwhile, from the content provider‘s point of view, 20 per cent of overall advertising budgets were dedicated to multiscreen campaigns. That is expected to grow to 50 per cent by 2016. It is clearly in every content owner’s best interest to react to this
evolution in the industry accordingly and immediately. I, and the rest of the staff at Visual Unity, have been resolving issues caused by these trends for quite some time now. The consumer behaviour and enthusiasm of technology investment funds to invest into companies with strong proven products and further technology potential, such as Visual Unity, give clear key on the future course of development in the media content industry. Tomas Petru is CEO and founder of Visual Unity www.visualunity.com info@visualunity.com
In focus: Ensuring scalability of networks to accommodate growth
D With thanks to
elivering video in a cost-effective way while maintaining the high quality of experience demanded by modern consumers is a challenge widely understood by operators. With premium features continuously evolving and content volume showing no sign of slowdown, operators are presented with another significant challenge: scalability of networks to accommodate this growth. From a consumer perspective, increased storage and lengthy catch-up services are an expectation. From a network delivery perspective, more content,
subscribers and devices creates a challenge for costeffective service scalability.
Edgeware offers the solution to these challenges The majority of cable and telco operators have a large install base of set top boxes connected via legacy networks such as QAM tuners or multicast IPTV routers. Rather than building duplicate, siloed delivery networks for new on-demand services to these devices and newer, multiscreen devices on broadband networks, The Edgeware D-VDN (Distributed Video Delivery Network) enables
consolidation to a single, unified delivery system with servers and control software that can record/cache and deliver content at massive scale to both device types. The Edgeware Accelerated Origin provides a highly consolidated origin system for all live and on-demand video services on any device – the promise of Cloud TV and DVR services brings huge pressure on head-end and origin architectures due to the substantial increases in recording, storage capacity and scaleout of origin servers required to guarantee play out performance
to any device. Edgeware’s Accelerated Origin combines massive recording and delivery capacity with high density, commoditised storage, load balancing and dynamic repackaging for different device types into a single, highly scalable solution. +46 73 612 6840 www.edgeware.tv
IBC2014 The world’s leading electronic media event IBC is the leading global tradeshow for professionals engaged in the creation, management and delivery of electronic media and entertainment. The event’s unparalleled exhibition and agenda setting conference encompass the very latest developments in broadcasting, mobile TV, IPTV, digital signage and R&D making it essential for everyone’s understanding of the industry and its future. IBC is a fixture on the calendar of the global media industry, attracting more than 52,000 professionals and 1,500+ exhibitors from more than 170 countries. Among them are the industry’s most senior executives who choose IBC’s highly respected conference to set and challenge the media agenda. The event plays host to a wide array of free-to-attend Industry Insight sessions, product demonstrations, big-screen movie presentations and the prestigious IBC Awards Ceremony. Innovations such as the IBC Future Zone and IBC Content Everywhere Workflow Solutions showcase technology at the cutting edge. New initiatives, such as the IBC Content Everywhere Cloud Solutions, keep the show at the forefront of innovation and industry attention. With all this and more, IBC is the place to learn and lead. RAI Amsterdam Conference: September 11-15, 2014 Exhibition: September 12-16, 2014 www.ibc.org
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August 2014 Business Technology • 15
The debate How close are we to the concept of TV Everywhere being a reality?
Campbell Foster
Matthias Kurth
Juhapekka Niemi VP sales & marketing Digia, Qt
Director of business development Edgeware
Matthew Parker
Anupam Gupta
From a technology perspective, TV Everywhere is already reality. Adobe Primetime and industry partners such as Akamai, Microsoft Azure, and thePlatform provide all the tools necessary to create, deliver and monetise amazing TV viewing experiences on any screen. The 2014 Sochi Games were a watershed moment for TV Everywhere, with the US vs Canada men’s hockey game drawing a record audience of over 2.1 million viewers. Adobe has moved beyond Flash, and its multiscreen TV platform, Adobe Primetime, provides a robust TVSDK that makes any screen a television, as well as the strongest DRM solution on the planet, uniquely flexible ad insertion that supports both client and server-side deployments, and a powerful ad server. The most important factor holding back broader TV Everywhere adoption is measurement: until Nielsen includes multiscreen consumption in its TV ratings, programmers will have little incentive to advance TV Everywhere. We believe that day will come sooner than later, and will continue to execute on our vision of making every screen a TV.
It’s close, but it could get closer. Fulfilment of TV Everywhere rests on three pillars: technological capability, consumer demand, and the right commercial and legal framework. Cable technology is already ahead of the curve and we’ve made a great start. And we know our customers want portability of their content as much as the cable industry wants to provide it. But some barriers still stand in our way. So let’s get that final piece right and see these services fulfil their true potential. The commercial and legal frameworks need to catch up with our future-proof technology and the consumer appetite. For portability of content, we need flexibility in licensing negotiations so that a cable customer can access their service on any device, wherever they are. We need content providers to agree on a new licensing structure. The European Commission already acknowledges this. It’s time for all the players to pull together to make it a reality.
From a technical perspective, TV Everywhere exists now. Most consumers are constantly within arm’s reach of a device that can show them video content that was only available on a TV 10 years ago. From a business perspective, there’s a race to define what “TV” really is and that race is going to be really long. From a consumer perspective, TV Everywhere will never be finished. The public’s appetite for new ways of consuming video will grow endlessly. As long as there is new content being produced, viewers will desire new context in which to consume it. This means new devices, new locations, new interaction tools, new apps and new software platforms.
Consumer demand is there, device capability is there – the challenge is one of being able to deliver content in a seamless and flawless manner. To achieve this requires a rethink in the way origin and head-end architectures are structured. Many thousands of simultaneous content requests from mobile devices will cause frequent cache misses that will increase load pressures on origin servers. We have seen very recent examples of this affecting major broadcasters in the World Cup and on OTT catch-up players – a poor quality of service and therefore customer experience will result in service switching and loss of revenue. The promise of cloud DVR will only expand this risk as consumers watch recorded content unavailable on catch-up services from mobile devices. To blindly scale up storage volumes and scale out origin play-out performance using existing approaches to architecture is both expensive and inefficient. Consolidation technologies that provide offload capabilities in the head end, while managing recording, load balancing and content repackaging must now be considered.
There’s still a way to go with TV Everywhere transitioning from a concept to a service widely used by pay-TV customers. Currently, that experience is offered in a very limited way through TV apps like HBO GO. Those customers are also gravitating to Over-The-Top providers, including Netflix, that can give them that anytime, anywhere video-watching experience which they can’t get right now from their video service provider. In order to stay competitive, video distributors, like cable operators and IPTV operators, need services that can help them manage the complexities of multiplatform video distribution, including content rights and processing, and launch a TVE service quickly. TV Everywhere has the potential to be the key to providing increased value to customers, while also raising their satisfaction levels. It’s just going to take time to ensure video distributors have the services in place to make it a seamless viewing experience, from TV to smartphone to tablet.
+32 2 521 1763 www.cable-europe.eu
+47 2108 0420 http://qt.digia.com
www.edgeware.tv
www.vubiquity.com
Director of product marketing Adobe Primetime
ExpertInsight
blogs.adobe.com/primetime
Executive chairman Cable Europe
EVP Cloud Services Vubiquity
Operators: control your own user experience and business model C onnected TV users are looking for a highquality UI and a content experience that integrates with their mobile devices. But will operators be forced to team up with the mobile giants? Google and Apple have both jumped on the opportunity to bring the technical and ecosystem attraction of Android and iOS from the mobile space to the connected TV world. Unfortunately, both these operating systems come with business model strings attached for TV vendors and operators as these mobile OSs cede device control and service revenue shares. Operators who are capable of building their own compelling connected TV experiences from commercially licensed technologies (rather than capitulating to the use of Google Android or Apple services) stand to keep their revenue, gain value and create their own value-driving ecosystems. For an example, one has to look no further than Netflix’s OTT
service and Comcast’s surging X1 platform. Netflix stole a march on an entire industry seemingly overnight by enabling an army of third parties to stream the all-you-can eat Netflix service to millions of homes. Comcast has responded with its own technology asset – the Comcast X1 Entertainment Platform, a modern cloud-based UI employing the RDK framework. Digia’s Qt technology has been employed in-house at Netflix and Comcast as the native, portable framework from which web integration, UI features and apps hang. Digia has invested considerably in making Qt valuable for the TV industry including integration of the Googlesupported Chromium web rendering project and making sure the Qt Quick UI technology can run iPhone-smooth on memory constrained, big-screen STB hardware. Qt already runs on iOS and Android as an aftermarket tool for app developers. We’re sure to see operators rolling together their own connected services that span
Android, iOS and their own STB deployments using Qt while keeping control their UX and keeping what’s theirs. Tony Wittry is senior manager, Qt key accounts, Digia +47 210 80420 http://qt.digia.com