TVBEurope March 2015 Digital Edition

www.tvbeurope.com

March 2015Business, insight and intelligence for the broadcast media industry

Behind the scenes at BBC S&PP The latest trends from CES 2015 Systems integrators forum

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TVBEurope 3March 2015 www.tvbeurope.com

Ibegin this issue with a revision of my editor’s

welcome from our last edition. Due to a

number of elements outside of our control,

we’ve endured the misfortune of having to return

to the drawing board with regard to the name

of our new conference initiative: Broadcast 2020

(and all related terminology) seemingly under

the lock and key of a certain other organisation.

For this reason, we’ve rebranded both our

conference and events week. TVBEurope 2020

will now serve as the one-day conference at

BAFTA, on 30 June, while the week itself will be

known as TVBEurope Strategy Week. More details

regarding the day’s agenda and speakers, as

well as the other events during the week, will be

released shortly.

The main thrust of this month’s issue revolves

ar ound training and education; a topic that has

fascinated me for the duration of my time in the

industry. And as Philip Stevens aptly suggests

in the preamble to his feature, the concept of

‘education’ is not the sole preserve of those

graduating from universities and colleges

seeking an entrée into the world of broadcast

and media… or whatever the cool kids are

calling it these days. The concept of education

and training is just as applicable to the more

seasoned and capable members of our industry

as they learn new skills to adapt to the changing

environment that

surrounds them. It’s

a fascinating article

that calls on a number

of people active in

the space to elicit

their understanding

of where the industry

is in its association

with the tutelage of

the next generation

of engineers and ‘technologists’, as some have

been known to label themselves, and the skills

development of the industry’s incumbents. It

is a subject that we’ll continue to monitor and

report on as the year progresses. Elsewhere in this

edition, we continue our investigation of cloud-

based broadcasting, as we ask whether it’s

make or break time for Ultraviolet in France. Our

editor, Melanie Dayasena-Lowe, also gets the

guided tour of BBC S&PP’s facilities out in Elstree,

while we fi t in a pre-NAB trip to Las Vegas to fi nd

out the latest trends and technologies emerging

from this year’s CES.

Our April issue is our annual NAB edition, so if

you want to be involved, be sure to get in touch.

I hope you enjoy this issue.

James McKeownExecutive Editor

Education and training in the sector is increasingly under the microscope

Welcome

Inspiring the next generation

EDITORIALExecutive Editor - James [email protected] - Melanie [email protected] Writer - Holly [email protected] Media, 1st Floor, Suncourt House, 18-26 Essex Road, London N1 8LN, England +44 207 354 6002Contributors - Chris Forrester, David Fox, David Davies, Dick Hobbs, John Ive, George Jarrett, Adrian Pennington, Philip Stevens, Catherine WrightHead of Digital - Tim FrostHuman Resources & Offi ce Manager - Lianne DaveyHead of Design - Jat GarchaEditorial Production Manager - Dawn Boultwood

Senior Production Executive - Alistair TaylorPublisher - Steve [email protected]+44 207 354 6000Sales Manager - Ben [email protected]+44 207 354 6000Account Manager - Richard [email protected]+44 207 354 6000Managing Director - Mark BurtonUS Sales - Michael MitchellBroadcast Media International, PO Box 44, Greenlawn, New York, NY [email protected]+1 (631) 673 0072Japan and Korea Sales - Sho HariharaSales & Project, Yukari Media [email protected]+81 6 4790 2222 Fax: +81 6 4793 0800CirculationNewBay Media, Sovereign Park, Lathkill Street, Market Harborough, LE16 9EF, UK

Free [email protected] Tel +44 1580 883848

TVBEurope is published 12 times a year by NewBay Media, 1st Floor, Suncourt House, 18-26 Essex Road, London, N1 8LN, England

NewBay Media is a member of the Periodical Publishers Association

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In this issue4 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

Instruction is not just for those entering the industry but also covers experienced personnel who need to improve skills. Philip Stevens looks at both aspects

Welcome to the Mediadome1218

8-10 Opinion and Analysis

41 TVBEverywhere

With a need to stay ahead of all the technological advances across the industry, Systems Integrators (SIs) are in a good position to keep a finger on the pulse of trends and developments. So, what challenges will 2015 bring forth for SIs? Philip Stevens finds out

44 Systems integrators forum

Research from SNL Kagan points to strong world-wide growth for OTT subscription video-on-de-mand services by the end of 2018. Norm Bogen, research director at SNL Kagan, offers a detailed insight into the company’s latest report

48 Data CentreFeature

26Melanie Dayasena-Lowe meets the executive team at BBC Studios and Post Production to take a behind the scenes tour of its facilities in Elstree and South Ruislip following its move from the iconic Television Centre

FeatureAdrian Pennington headed over to Las Vegas to check out the latest trends at this year’s International Consumer Electronics Show (CES)

Ericsson has expanded from its pay-TV core and onto the front line of global content delivery. George Jarrett pays a visit to the company’s new Paris Mediadome, a symbol of its intent in the area of mobile broadband and non-linear media

35

Back to school

Daniele Tricarico, senior analyst at Pyramid Research, explains how OTT providers are pushing paid services in emerging markets to futureproof their business models

Transmitter efficiency comes of age: it’s a new dawn for reducing costs at what’s long been considered among the more expensive stages in the air chain

Opinion and Analysis6 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

While Media Asset Management

(MAM) solutions have been serving

broadcasters and global media

companies for over a decade, two of the

biggest challenges remain: cost effectiveness

and practical deployment. In 2015 desktops,

departments and multiple sites can work with

third-party programme makers upstream and

many more delivery partners downstream.

Add to this the explosion in mobile media

consumption and audience interaction and

it’s easy to see why the dream of cost-scalable

interconnectivity and effective media staging via

cloud-based services is so popular.

To better meet future requirements and

to deliver an ROI from MAM and workflow

investment, both can now be fully integrated

across the entire media value chain. From

acquisition through to production and delivery,

MAM systems provide efficient and cost-effective

operations and users can expect increased

content management options. These include

integration of different areas for processing

automation; sophisticated workflow management

for content preparation; and web-based user

interface to simplify support and enable multi-site

workflows all supported by the cloud.

The cloud can also provide improved media

management and storage options. These range

from storage services with additional backup

in a separate locations and content storage with

the additional capability to transcode different

formats for delivery, to full MAM features for content

management providing complete search capability

and the ability for content to be managed by third-

party service providers if required.

This last scenario provides broadcasters

with a full multi-tenant MAM in the cloud with

independent virtual MAMs sharing the same IT

platform, providing an always-online multi-site

architecture. This is a sophisticated model that

allows broadcasters to search, select and share

content via the cloud with a very high Quality

of Service (QoS). Media files are delivered

automatically in the correct working format for

the recipient regardless of the original format.

Key drivers for managing workflow and content via the cloudDistributed access enables anyone within the

organisation to access content from any location.

This high level of flexibility means that it’s easier to

evolve and amend media services, and time to

market is also reduced if the cloud infrastructure is

already available. Broadcasters, for example, can

focus more on their core business of programme

making, brand care and audience engagement.

Speed of delivery is also key. To meet the

demands of the multiscreen world, broadcasters

require solutions that enable fast and secure

access over IP, providing automated workflows

that package and present content, which can

then be delivered to the cloud and other sites.

This removes the unnecessary complexity caused

when working between so many desktops and

departments using LAN or MPLS.

It’s also no longer enough to simply move

many thousands of media files over IP quickly

and securely without an improvement in

productivity. Broadcasters and increasingly

telcos are also now faced with the challenge

of how to automatically manage and monitor

the enormous volume of media and metadata

that’s being exchanged with multiple media

partners 24/7. This will only continue to increase.

Adapting typical broadcast processes or relying

on simple IP accelerators or transcoding is not

scalable or cost-effective.

To provide suitable security and efficiency it’s

important that systems are designed for cloud-

based infrastructure and application services

from the ground up. This enables the real-world

complexities of multimedia content exchange

and packaging to be streamlined, while still using

standard third-party IP managers and cloud-

based storage and distribution solutions.

Tedial has taken a whole new approach

to helping the many diverse players in global

media work together with its cloud enabled

Media Exchange Platform (MEP). MEP provides

automated workflows to deliver to multiple sites

and third-party systems. It maximises the re-use

and minimises the re-working of material and

allows large media assets to be moved and

transformed efficiently making use of Tedial’s

centralised management capability without the

need for extensive IT support.

Employing solutions like this, content producers,

broadcasters, pay-TV operators, service providers

and telcos can work collaboratively on their

media, securely and efficiently. Whether it’s

upstream during news, sports and co-production or

downstream during multi-platform packaging and

distribution, using cloud-based media transfers.

How does the cloud improve your MAM options?

By Julián Fernández-Campón, director, head of solution architecture, Tedial

‘From acquisition through to production and delivery, MAM systems provide

efficient and cost-effective operations’

‘It’s no longer enough to simply move many thousands of media files over IP quickly and securely without an improvement in productivity’ – Julián Fernández-Campón, Tedial

Opinion and Analysis8 TVBEurope VBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

The broadcast transmitter is shedding its

long-standing reputation as an energy-

hogging beast with a massive footprint,

and for very good reason. Manufacturers

have made exceptional strides in transmitter

efficiency in recent years, often through

proprietary design strategies that enhance

power density, amplification and other built-in

resources. These developments are lowering

long-term operating costs for the broadcaster

and network operator.

Several drivers have influenced manufacturers

to design more efficient transmitters. Europe

has been particularly aggressive with carbon

footprint taxes and fees, for example. As a result,

many of our customers across Europe have long

been focused on building more efficient over-

the-air networks. Globally, many broadcasters

are following corporate mandates to institute

‘greener’ facilities and operating procedures to

minimise environmental impact.

A third factor is the age-old concern of

reducing general operating costs. Whereas

many broadcasters and network operators

initially sought cost reduction at the studio or

headend, the focus has gradually shifted to the

transmitter room.

These three factors – government regulations,

socially conscious corporate mandates, and

general operating cost reduction – have all played

fundamental roles in transmitter design efficiency.

The ultimate goal for vendors is to deliver high-

efficiency, over-the-air systems that deliver low

total cost of ownership for their customers.

Design factorsMany design factors play a role in transmitter

efficiency, but most revolve around three pillars:

footprint, maintenance and energy management,

the final of which mainly constitutes power

consumption and effective cooling.

Gains in energy efficiency certainly have an

impact on the customer’s bottom line over time. In

a DVB-T or T2 system, GatesAir calculates a typical

total cost of ownership savings of 38 per cent over

previous-generation systems – nearly €195,000 over

ten years based on transmitter system, transmitter

cooling and building HVAC costs at an energy cost

of 0.14 kW/hour. However, for the purpose of this

article we’ll focus more on the operational value

afforded through modern design efficiencies.

On the footprint side, the transmitter continues

to shrink from a size and weight perspective. For

example, the typical high-power, high-efficiency

GatesAir UHF transmitter today is up to 75 per

cent smaller and significantly lighter than models

one decade ago. These reductions play a

significant role in cost savings from initial shipment

through its operating lifecycle:

Modular designs: shipping transmitters

modularly reduce cargo size from door to

door. Modular shipments also accelerate

installation once on site, simplifying the process of

connecting and bringing the transmitter to air.

Reduced transportation costs: significant

weight reductions make the transmitter far less

expensive to transport.

Personal safety: previous-generation designs

typically dictated that heavier power modules

and supplies inside the transmitter required

a two-man lift. This meant dispatching two

engineers to a site for maintenance. With these

components now much lighter in weight – often

under 10kg – a one-man lift is satisfactory.

Building space: the smaller overall footprint

not only opens up more room for maintenance,

auxiliary equipment and general comfort, it brings

the additional benefit of reducing rental costs.

This is especially significant in Europe, where many

network operators rent floor space in shared

facilities. Similarly, building owners open more rental

space to other broadcasters by freeing additional

floor space through more compact transmitters.

To expand on this last point of facility utilisation,

one of our European transmitter customers reports

that the smaller footprints eliminate the need to

expand buildings. In the past, this network operator,

which operates its own facilities, in some cases

added real estate to existing buildings upon

adding a new programme multiplex. The costs and

labour that went into these initiatives were massive,

to the point of easily rising into the hundreds of

thousands of Euros. Much of this size and weight

reduction has to do with improvements in power

density through modern LDMOS device-driven

Transmitter efficiency comes of age

It’s a new dawn for reducing costs at what’s been long considered among the more expensive stage in the air chain. By Rich Redmond, chief product officer, GatesAir

10 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

Opinion and Analysis

technology, which constitutes the transistors

used in transmitter power amplifiers. Specifically,

in higher power models, these advancements

achieve more power out of a single rack, often

eliminating the traditional second rack. On the

lower power side, that single rack consolidates

several transmitters versus taking up an entire

rack each. Many of these benefits correlate

directly to what we call broadband high-

efficiency amplification.

Broadband amplification demystifiedThough the notion of high transmitter efficiency

has only recently entered the broadcast lexicon,

it’s not necessary a late-breaking innovation. At

GatesAir, early high-efficiency transmitter designs

date several decades to our patented digital AM

Radio modulation techniques, balancing superior

audio performance with 90 per cent AC-to-RF

efficiency. This resulted in very limited energy and

heat waste. Many contemporary designs are only

beginning to catch up. Fast forwarding, major

strides were made in 2007 upon the introduction

of advanced LDMOS technology within our

PowerSmart transmitter architecture – the core

design responsible for reducing transmitter size,

weight and energy use; as well as simplifying

maintenance. The introduction of PowerSmart 3D

last year further extended transmitter efficiency

through what we call broadband amplification.

In layman’s terms, broadband amplification

represents a further simplification of interior

design. Additionally, the presence of a software-

defined modulator enables simple frequency

and modulation changes.

Fewer frequency-determined parts invite higher

efficiency from a maintenance standpoint. Instead

of labour-intensive component and sub-assembly

changes, relocation to a new frequency is software-

driven. By punching the new channel frequency into

a software-defined modulator, the single amplifier

– which is, by definition, broadband – readjusts for

the frequency change. That reduction of amplifiers

and other interior components also results in the

need for fewer spare parts. Consider how this is

useful for large network operators in Europe, who

may be operating several programme multiplexes

across many different frequencies. In addition

to simplifying frequency changes, the same set

of broadband spare parts can be shared across

the transmitter network. The software-defined

modulator also accelerates in-the-field transitions

from one standard to another. Through the same

single amplifier, moving from analogue to DVB-T

– or, DVB-T to DVB-T2 or even DAB Radio – is now

a software-driven procedure versus maintenance-

heavy, component-driven alterations. This protects

the investment for the customer who buys today

with plans to evolve moving forward.

There are many avenues to explore in

transmitter efficiency, and we have only

scratched the surface here. The takeaway here

is that multiple contributing factors have evolved

to the point where the broadcaster and network

operator can save a great deal of money over

the lifecycle of the transmitter. Perhaps those new

services are delivered through additional terrestrial

channels or emerging mobile opportunities

through advanced LTE networks. Overall,

improvements in transmitter efficiency offer a

clear win for today’s over-the-air broadcaster.

Workfl ow12 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

Training in the broadcast industry appears

to have taken on a renewed impetus in

recent times. The courses currently on

offer have become more varied and attract

not just newcomers but those who wish to

hone their expertise.

In 2013, the BBC, along with technology

partners including Arqiva, Red Bee Media,

ITV and Channel 4, launched a three-year

technology scheme for apprentices working

towards a BEng in Broadcasting Engineering

taught and accredited by the University of

Salford and Birmingham City University. The

training and development programme is

managed by the BBC Academy on behalf

of BBC Technology.

“The aim is to produce the broadcast

technologists of the future – not just for the BBC,

but for the industry as a whole,” head of entry

level talent, Claire Paul, explains. “There is an

ageing demographic working in this industry,

and this scheme forms part of addressing that

situation. The skills these young people will

acquire are going to be in huge demand.”

In September 2014, the initial intake of 11

apprentices completed their fi rst year on the

scheme, with over half achieving ‘fi rsts’ with their

early results. They have already worked with BBC

Technology Operations, ITV’s Coronation Street,

Channel 4, Red Bee Media Playout, ITV Regional

News and Arqiva (radio and TV transmitters).

The second intake, in September 2014, saw 28

join the scheme and these will be working in Salford,

Birmingham, Bristol, Southampton and London.

Huw Davies, programme manager, technology

apprentices and trainee schemes, reveals

more. “Basically, there are two main areas:

IT and technology delivery. The work ranges

from designing and installing technical and

production systems for a BBC building in Cardiff

to introducing a new meeting room booking

system in Birmingham.”

But he adds a note of reality. “While apprentices

and trainees won’t be dropped straight in the

deep end on their work placements, and at fi rst will

be more likely to fi nd themselves repairing broken

headphones than installing foreign bureaux,

they’ll also be spending a lot of time studying.

The graduates don’t get to work outside the BBC,

but will be employed across support areas that

manage BBC Radio and TV Studios, production

systems, outside broadcasting and major projects,

including new buildings or installing new facilities.”

Multi-discipline trainingIn Germany, the ARD.ZDF medienakademie

is the central training facility for broadcasters.

Alongside a wide range of video and audio

courses, the facility provides training in journalism

and courses for personality development. In

all, about 500 different topics and courses are

conducted in facilities in Nürnberg, Hannover or

in-house at clients’ premises.

The academy has comprehensive multi-

camera facilities, although single camera

production is also offered. Those facilities include

two studios equipped with SD as well as LDK 6000

HD cameras, DD35 vision switchers, Lawo and

Yamaha audio mixers, VizRT graphics, Riedel

communication units, Quantel and Omneon

servers, ENPS and Open Media.

In addition, the post production section

comprises more than 15 suites connected to

Avid Isis, Interplay and Avid playout, and a similar

number of Final Cut Pro suites.

Keeping track of trainingInstruction is not just for those entering the industry, it also covers experienced personnel who need to improve skills. Philip Stevens looks at both aspects

The BBC training course will produce the broadcast technologists of the future

“The aim is to produce the broadcast technologists of the future – not just for

the BBC, but for the industry as a whole”Claire Paul

Workflow

College coursesRavensbourne, a specialist higher education media

and design institution based in central London, has

an enrolment of around 2,400 students.

Jeremy Barr, who is visiting broadcasting

professor and associate dean for the production

cluster of courses, has been instrumental in

Ravensbourne’s Degree, Postgraduate and

also Higher National Diploma courses. “Our

philosophy is to give students a genuine sense of a

professional working environment, and a context in

which they learn to use the appropriate tools.”

That started with Ravensbourne taking a

different decision from many other specialist

institutions, installing equipment that is used by

most broadcasters in a professional setting. “This

meant what Ravensbourne was – and is – offering

is an understanding that we are not playing with

television. We are serious people and our students

need to understand the power of the medium,

as well as learning the techniques,” explains

Professor Barr.

Today, the studio within the campus is equipped

with Sony cameras and monitors, a Snell Kahuna

vision mixer, SSL and Avid audio consoles and Fork

servers. All the major editing systems can be found

in the post production section. Barr goes on, “If

we are training people to be useful in the work

environment, they need to be familiar with the

systems they will find outside of these walls.”


“Our philosophy is to give students a genuine sense of a professional working environment, and a context in which they learn to use the appropriate tools”

Jeremy Barr

Workflow14 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

In addition, students can borrow

more than 4,000 different pieces

of the latest equipment, including

cameras, lighting, microphones,

laptops, IT accessories and more,

from the Central Loan Resource

within Ravensbourne.

Ravensbourne also offers a

digital cinema course for those

who would see their future in

single camera production. “But

I do not see these as separate

cultures,” reports Barr. “After all,

you need to be familiar with both

technologies in order to use them

in the most appropriate way.” He

adds, “I’m very careful not to say

that we train students to be, let’s

say, drama directors. We train

them to tell the story – and that

story could be news, sport or

any other genre.”

Alongside their coursework,

students have the opportunity once

a year to broadcast a range of

programmes on a Freeview channel

to allow their productions to be seen

by a wider audience.

Latest technologyThe Media School at Bournemouth

University offers courses that

serve both undergraduate and

post graduate students, including

Media Production, Journalism

& Communication, Computer

Animation, and Corporate &

Marketing Communications.

The school also provides Top-Up

courses and Foundation Degrees.

“Over the last couple of years

we have made some significant

improvements and equipment

purchases,” explains Keith

Heyward, technical support

group manager.

“We have changed from our

studio-based server editing system

to an Avid ISIS 5000. This enables

us to play in from the timeline, but

also allows students to work on

material from networked editing

suites. We have also built

a second studio.”

Another campus improvement

has centred on an extensive fibre

network. “This is an asset in many

Steve Warner

“As the broadcast industry slowly recovers, the need for training is becoming more important”

Steve Warner, IABM

ways, but it has particularly helped the journalism

students to bring together localised OB content

for the News Day programmes. That news

environment has also been boosted by

the installation of a TriCaster Studio and

Panasonic cameras.”

Swedish viewSweden’s Stockholm Academy of Dramatic

Art – a part of Uniarts – offers a three-year

BA course for TV producers and an MA

programme in film and media. The Diploma

programme centres on practical work such as

editing and interviewing, but also involves theory,

including the development of new formats.

“The courses are conducted by industry

professionals who have a good record in

the field, rather than those with just tuition

skills,” says Tinna Joné, head of the Film and

Media department.

In order to graduate, students are required

to make several productions in different genres

which are evaluated by teachers and external

producers. The Academy also has its own

channel, StDH-play, where students can show

the result of their work.

Accredited coursesBut it’s not just broadcasters and colleges that

offer training. Brian Cantwell, managing director

at Soho Editors Media Group, reveals that

demand for courses has been steady for several

years. “What has been noticeable is the transition

from one software manufacturer’s solution to

another. Also, the growth of the subscription

model operated by most NLE software

manufacturers has opened up customers to new

workflows and opportunities they might not have

previously accessed. Take the Creative Cloud,

for example. Customers may sign up because

they want Premiere Pro, and soon realise they

also have a wealth of professional software

packages included, for instance, After Effects

and Photoshop.”

Cantwell’s company, with classrooms in

London and Manchester, offers manufacturers

accredited training courses for Adobe, Apple,

Avid and Blackmagic Design. It will also provide

training at other locations, and will devise a

fully tailored course, designed specifically to a

customer’s requirements.

“Traditionally, most courses are designed

to teach delegates a new tool set,” explains

Cantwell. “This is very important, as a lack of

knowledge about the applications can severely

restrict the creative process. However, that is only

the beginning. Learning a new tool set empowers

users to explore and investigate deeper than any

course can do in the time available. All delegates

take home a course manual and the training

media, so they have everything they need to

continue learning at their own pace.”

After listening to customers’ feedback,

Soho Editors saw a lack of creative opportunities.

“Having left university or college and

perhaps taken a certified course, how are you

expected to learn how to be a better editor?


Workflow


In August 2014, we launched Inside The Edit, the

world’s first online creative editing course. This

software-agnostic course is unique, and focuses

purely on teaching the craft of editing. Skills that

will take someone a great deal of time to learn

are now available online and compress ten years

or more of experience into a few months study.”

MentorsBroadcast hire company, Procam, has also

embarked on a major initiative. “Training is key at

Procam,” asserts John Brennan, Group CEO. “We

already have an established in-house training

programme that, over a two-year period, see

trainees start as drivers before moving into

the kit room. Our partnership with the MAMA

Youth Project started in 2014 when we donated

£100,000 worth of HD equipment. We’ve now

extended our support by offering its graduates a

13-week place on our training programme.”

Trainees will get to know over 2,000 different

pieces of broadcast equipment before

developing their understanding of how best to

create quality video and audio. “Each trainee

will be provided with a hand-picked mentor from

Procam’s staff, who has had 20 years experience

in the broadcast industry. The mentors will be

with them every step of the way to answer

any question, provide sage advice and make

sure each trainee’s development is tailored

to a career path that matches their individual

strengths,” explains Brennan.

Upturn means trainingSteve Warner, training manager, IABM, agrees

there has been an increase in demand for

courses. “Historically, when budgets are tight or

there’s an economic downturn, one of the first

things to be cut is training. Now, as the broadcast

industry slowly recovers, the need for training is

becoming more important. This is also vital as the

number of engineers dwindles, due to retirement.”

Warner sees the increasing convergence of IT on

broadcast as an important area for training. “On

the one hand, there are broadcast engineers

with excellent skills and qualifications, but who

have little to no broader IT knowledge in terms of

software, networking, IP, and so on. Conversely,

there are highly qualified IT professionals well-

versed in all aspects of IT, but who lack a basic

understanding of broadcasting.”

To meet those needs, the IABM training courses,

which generally run for two days, are designed

to address both the needs of new entrants to

broadcast and the up-skilling of existing broadcast

engineers in the new technologies.

Cross expertiseDescribing online training features in Dalet’s

educational programme, Ben Davenport,

director of marketing for the company, points

out that a recent survey showed the average

broadcast engineer is 50 years old. “We know

from discussions with our customers, partners and

competitors that there is difficulty in recruiting

staff, whether broadcast, post, production or on

the vendor side. More importantly, when we try

to recruit staff and when we find engineers skilled

in video, or skilled in IT, or aware of the business

applications of the technology, it’s rare to find

resources that tie all of this together.”

To remedy that situation, the Dalet Academy was

launched in January to provide free and relevant

broadcast education. Davenport states that the

Dalet Academy will feature a broad range of

topics, from complex media manipulations to

advanced, end-to-end workflows, with input from

a substantial number of seasoned contributors

both from Dalet and the industry at large.

“Using the academy.dalet.com URL, our goal

is to create a one-stop-training centre where

our customers and partners can find a variety of

educational material to meet their needs.”

The tools will include Bruce’s Shorts, the highly

successful weekly video where Dalet’s chief media

scientist Bruce Devlin explains a complicated issue

in a short, two-minute presentation. In addition,

Dalet’s Blog gives non-product-specific insights

about trends in the industry, emerging technologies

and even some of the politics of standardisation

in the sector. Alongside these features will be

Dalet’s white papers, industry articles, case studies

and free webinars.

Sporting chancesIn January, The National Film and Television

School (NFTS) in the UK launched a unique Sports

Production diploma course in partnership with

independent sports producer, IMG. The 12-month

course, starting in January 2016, will equip students

with editorial skills required to produce live sports

and events coverage, highlights content and

other material. It includes a four-week internship

at the IMG Studios.

“In a rapidly-evolving media landscape,

IMG understands the strategic value of skills

development and nurturing the brightest

new entrant talent,” states Tim Ball, IMG’s

head of production. “Therefore, we are

very pleased to be collaborating with NFTS

to introduce this innovative diploma and

foster the next generation of television and

digital sports professionals.”

Bournemouth University’s media school has equipped a studio for its journalism students

“We know from discussions with our customers, partners and competitors that

when we try to recruit staff and find engineers skilled in video, IT, or aware of the business

applications of the technology, it’s rare to find resources that tie all of this together”

Ben Davenport, Dalet

Through a cunningly judged sequence of

acquisitions and a laudable willingness

to back its development plans with hefty

investment, Ericsson has expanded from its pay-TV

core onto the front line of global content delivery.

The consolidation moves involving Technicolor

Broadcast Services, Red Bee, and Mediaroom

triggered a complete change of corporate face,

and the launch of its Paris Mediadome is strong

verifi cation of its long-term intent in the area of mobile

broadband and non-linear media in general.

The Mediadome is not a Red Bee Media clone,

it has one huge sitting tenant (Canal+ Overseas),

and its HQ is in an old printing house, which offers

seven tons of fl oor strength per square metre.

Many of the 200 Ericsson personnel (Canal+

also has 200 people on site) were at a previous

facility in St Cloud, and Jérôme Monteil, head

of sales in France, explained how the move had

been planned.

“Over the last two years we took on fi ve

big systems integration jobs: at the BFM news

channel; France 24, where we put in fi ve studios

and automation for production; TV5, where it

did the production, post and playout elements;

and the Canal+ free to air channels, where

we built a technical room and re-built the

playout side,” he said.

“And then we did all the work at the

Mediadome for Canal+ Overseas and ourselves.

In a fi ve to ten-year period, technology changes

a lot, but the experience we accrued in the

systems integration work we could use here.

For example, the signals are above you and the

network is under the fl oor,” he added.

Technical room one, oozing good practice,

holds all the broadcast kit. The second one

holds all the IT stuff, the MAM, virtualisation

and storage, and all the software glue and the

interface to customers.

“This was built by Ericsson architects and

developers. The company stands at number

fi ve in the world for software development,”

said Monteil. “We wanted to keep control of the

Workfl ow18 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

Ericsson’s French Dome

“Giving good quality and good services for production and post production and non-linear playout is key” – Jérôme Monteil

George Jarrett reports from Ericsson’s new Mediadome facility in Paris

The studio has nine Sony robotic cameras and a seven-person gallery


Workflow

software glue and the customer interface. We

do a lot of pre-processing to minimise any

hardware necessities.”

The big difference from St Cloud is the

dominance of IT workflows, so much of the pre-

opening training centered on the architecture

and designing the media workflow. Linear

playout via satellite is the bread and butter,

but for how long?

“We created a global media centre.

Managing the media is also managing the

workflows in terms of non-linear and the

preparation for that,” said Monteil. “You can

trigger workflows to prepare for non-linear, but

it is difficult to be sure about what will happen.

Everybody is looking for the right business model

and at monetising their content. Netflix is really

building that. But with video, people are used

to not paying.”

Game changersWhile many companies seek that elusive business

model, Monteil believes Netflix and Amazon

will change the game radically. Meanwhile,

Ericsson’s customer base wants something else.

“More and more we see them searching

for a model for being domestic and more

international, both in the production and

distribution of content. In France it is not so

easy, and the English spoken countries are

far advanced,” said Monteil. “With Red Bee

and EBS (Ericsson Broadcast Services) we

can consider we have a presence in eight

countries, but Ericsson itself in Telcos and IT is in

180 countries. I would not say we will be present

in 180 countries, but the expansion into other

territories is key.”

A major factor in France has been outsourcing

some contracts, in both the Dome and in

customer locations.

“We have ten sites in Paris, and if we are in the

customer location, then we are in the customer

location. For locations that are pure ‘Ericsson’,

the idea is to build something that is scalable

enough to put workflows between the sites so

we can manage the load, the services, and skills

at each site,” said Monteil. “Today, we manage

the interface through our own architecture

and software development, but we have some

partners in terms of MAM.”

This will involve the other hubs. EBS had locations

in the UK, Sweden, France and Holland, and

now provides services in Australia, Germany

and Spain. All will be connected. Red Bee has

30 people in France working on access services.

Monteil identifies that area, plus creative

services and metadata management, as

three business strengths that Mediadome

needs to develop.

“Red Bee is recognised worldwide for content

discovery. We really have to think of more

services globally,” said Monteil. “As you saw,

the production and post production parts are

interesting. Production alone is not our field.

For current customers we can do any post

production, but there is not a specific reason

to develop it massively.”

“Five years ago, a playout room of this size could only handle six channels”

Jérôme Monteil, Ericsson

Monteil and Ericsson are eying the huge melt

between the distribution modes. The big issues

are time to market, and generating quality

content that is exclusive.

“The more you focus on live and quality,

the more you will have to produce some parts

yourself, and to promote them with trailers, which

means some post production,” he said. “If you

have that link to the editorial teams, then you

have an acceptable offer. We need to add on

top of that, for sure, the non-linear part.”

This leads to providing all the technical elements

so Mediadome can also develop services in

production and post that it has not cracked

or defined yet.

“To have a complete media brand, media

channel, is something we want to develop.

Giving good quality and good services for

production and post production and non-

linear playout is key, and it is fundamental for

the future. Clearly, we can feel that Ericsson is

there to invest: in 2020 there will be 50 million

connected devices, with 15 million of them

pushing video everywhere, and all the networks

will be obsessed with video. We will play in this

field,” said Monteil.

Asked what differences he detected between

the Telco and media markets, he said: “It was

the number of suppliers but that is changing now

with all the consolidation. If we recall the success

of GSM and wireless networks in the 1990s it

became the standardisation that was very clear

and straight between the different bricks. Here

in video and broadcast the standardisation is

probably not as mature as amongst the Telcos.”

Monteil points to huge amounts of technical

and editorial metadata strangling the

standardisation process.

“Very often things are customised across

the habits, culture and the way broadcasters

are working, so when will we have a complete

mature world standard in the video space

like we had in the 90s at the start of wireless

networks?” he said.

Where then can Ericsson use its brand muscle?

It already delivers 2.7 million hours of TV content

in 90-plus languages for 330 channels. This all

comes with 200,000 hours of captioning.

“We saw it with the systems integrations we

did. If you talk to a supplier as a global brand,

which wants to invest, it is always easier to

leverage and propose to the broadcaster that

it may be more difficult to get technology

alone,” said Monteil.

“We would like to act like that, talking to

suppliers, to get the best for broadcasters locally,

through our knowledge and global brand.”


In The IcebergMediadome, safely away from the Seine, offers

full back up to all the French broadcasters,

who have their HQs nearby. The building is an

office block on top of a much wider footprint

3,000sqm TV facility, locally called The Iceberg.

The studio has nine Sony robotic cameras

and a seven-person gallery. Canal+ uses

it almost constantly, for soccer, NBA and

magazine show purposes.

From Ericsson’s facility claims, the studio

gallery and studio are the production part,

but the Canal+ studio set is not currently

removable. For any client wanting production

time Ericsson would have to book to suit

Canal+ schedules and bring in special sets.

Mediadome has 11 editing rooms, two sound

mixing rooms with Pro Tools, and four speaker

booths. Any Ericsson customer could use the

post production facilities, but they are 80 per

cent used by Canal+ editorial teams at present.

The rooms are all based on Avid Media

Composer systems and supported by Avid

Interplay PAM (Production Asset Management)

and ISIS shared storage. Ericsson manages

its own dark fibre so time to market – global

delivery – is very fast, via either SDI or IP. A third

technical room exists to handle rack expansion

by another 30 channels.

The playout room is a beauty. Currently, it puts

out just under 30 channels, and has a capacity

of 60. The majority of signals are HD, file-based

working with incoming content stands at 80 per

cent, and tapes were evident. There are four

pods at each end to add live event channels.

Jérôme Monteil: “The more you focus

on live and quality, the more you will have to

produce some parts yourself”


Long gone are those days when live interviews

with politicians, business executives, charity

leaders, analysts and others had to be

conducted in television studios. Now, it is common

to conduct those ‘face-to-face’ discussions from

considerable distances – with the interviewee

seen in the environment of his or her own offi ce.

Of course, that means the installation of

professional broadcasting equipment in the

remote location and the booking of circuits

to meet transmission schedules, and one

company that provides such services is

London-based Globelynx.

“We offer a complete package that includes

everything needed to manage these activities

– such as high defi nition cameras, lighting and

the network infrastructure required to link the fi rm

to the broadcaster community,” explains chief

executive, David FitzGerald. “When a TV producer

calls an interviewee to request a live or recorded

discussion, it is then a simple matter to book the

airtime through our online booking system.”

The Globelynx booking system confi rms the

interview details instantly online and by email and

ensures that the interviewee’s camera is switched

to the right broadcaster at the agreed time.

Founded in 2001, the company became part of

the Press Association ten years later. Its stated mission

statement was – and remains – to consolidate its

position as a leader in the provision of in-house video

and broadcast solutions for enterprises and live

interviews to TV news broadcasters.

Last year, Globelynx laid out plans to expand

its business model by selling its services right

across Europe – and even further afi eld. At the

same time, it wanted to reach out to overseas

broadcasters directly.

“However, we found that we were being

held back by our existing technology, as we

were relying on a legacy SDI system for the

transmission of our services,” reports FitzGerald.

“There circuits have a high bandwidth baseband

capacity, typically priced on a per-kilometre

basis, so the further the data has to travel,

the more expensive it becomes. Obviously,

this is a particular problem when it comes to

international expansion.”

To fi nd a solution and provide the upgrades that

were needed to fulfi l its expansion plans, Globelynx

turned to Easynet, a global managed service

provider, to replace the existing baseband network

Down the line via IPWith IP increasingly being used by broadcasters, Philip Stevens investigates how one service provider is utilising the technology

The installation of professional broadcasting equipment in remote locations provides ready access for live interviews for news and other organisations Workfl ow


with a fully managed IP broadcasting service.

“We selected Easynet because of its track record

delivering HD quality IP broadcasting services to

well-known brand names, such as Sky News, Sky

Sports News, MTV and Comedy Central,” confirms

FitzGerald. “The company has also proved that it

can provide fully-managed international services

that can monitor pictures as well as data.”

Flexibility of IPJohn Cullane, head of media and broadcast at

Easynet, picks up the story. “As soon as you begin

to go international with SDI circuits, they start to

get incredibly expensive, as well as offering less

functionality than IP. The use of IP gives flexibility, and

offers symmetrical access to deliver high quality bi-

directional feeds at low bandwidths, with dynamic

formatting options and potential for simultaneous

delivery to multiple locations to aid the production

process. It also enables the use of networking

components familiar to non-specialist IT teams.”

The previous technology utilised by Globelynx

meant broadcast links had to be routed through

London, and then delivered back to the

broadcasters – a cumbersome and expensive

exercise. Using the Easynet IP domain, the

company is now able to deliver direct to national

broadcasters in countries around the world on a

24/7 basis, without having to link via London.

Better service, a lower costEasynet’s answer provides an end-to-end solution

that converts the baseband SDI signal at the

client’s end, transmits it across the IP network, and

then converts it back at the broadcaster’s end.

As part of the process, Easynet examined

Globelynx’s existing networks to identify the

hardware, providers and cost models that would

be best suited to the project. The result of this

survey was a final solution that offers savings of 50

per cent compared with other alternatives.

Cullane explains how the changes have

enabled Globelynx to transform how it does

business and reduce its costs. “The new IP

architecture reduces human intervention and

manual switching through the use of an automation

scheduler and Quality Checking via Easynet’s Video

Network Operations Centre (VNOC).”

Efficiency through automationAnother key element that Easynet provided was

an automation solution that enables Globelynx

to have greater control over how broadcasters

make their bookings, while reducing the amount

of human resources needed.

In order to arrange an interview, a broadcaster

would previously go to a web page and book

in a time, which would then require the paths

for the video transmission to be built manually.

Easynet was able to put in a complete platform

to automate this process, as well as improve how

broadcasters find the right people to contact.

According to FitzGerald, this arrangement

has been greatly appreciated by Globelynx’s

broadcast clients which include Sky News, CNBC

and Bloomberg Television. “This will make it much

easier for them to arrange interviews. There’ll

be an improved, searchable database where

broadcasters can search for experts in particular

topics. So if there’s a major news story on, say

Japan, they can insert ‘Japanese economy’ into

the database, and up will come the available

experts on that topic for them to book.”


Workflow

Cullane explained more. “Once the broadcaster

schedules the booking, from that point forward,

the actual creation of the video, and making

the path live is all done through an automated

service platform, under the careful monitoring of

the Easynet VNOC.” He adds that this also

makes the service much more scalable, so

Globelynx no longer needs to provision twice

the resources in order to double the number of

bookings it can handle.

He continues, “This new service enables

Globelynx to share real time HD content across a

secure IP network, fully integrated with cameras

at, currently, 80 sites. Moving to IP gives Globelynx

a strong competitive edge in next generation

content delivery through its built-in security and

vast capacity. Additionally, when compared to

legacy technology, a new IP-based network will

deliver significant cost savings, as well as offering

enhanced levels of reliability.”

FitzGerald concludes, “Digital media has

led us to expect instant, flawless multiplatform

delivery. More of us are watching news on our

tablets and PCs, and now if we read a story on

Twitter, we’ll frequently head across to a news

website to validate it with text or video, then to

another site to source a different perspective.

With video content expected to make up 79 per

cent of the world’s online traffic by 2018, there’s

more demand than ever for real time interview

content, and more places than ever to access

it. We’re confident that the switch to Easynet’s IP

Broadcasting will help us strengthen our foothold

in this dynamic industry.”

Globelynx customers include Sky News

BBC Studios and Post Production (BBC

S&PP) in Elstree was a hive of activity last

December with shows like Strictly Come

Dancing, BBC’s Sweat the Small Stuff and Sky’s

A League Of Their Own on site.

Taking a tour behind the scenes meant

walking down the corridors of Holby City,

past the glittery backdrop of Strictly Come

Dancing, and even catching a glimpse of

Simon Webbe and Kristina Rihanoff rehearsing

the American Smooth.

As Mark Lewis, operational compliance

manager, explains, BBC S&PP has been

inundated with shows since its move over from

Television Centre to the Elstree site in spring 2013.

At the BBC Elstree site, in Studio D, series 9 of A

League Of Their Own was in production and the

set really fills the space, explains Lewis. “Productions

such as this like to have an outside space that

they can do rehearsals in and filming so it’s good

that we’ve got that as an extra offering. We’re

refurbishing all of our dressing rooms. It’s important

to have that softer element of the studio as well.”

Once the Sky show had finished, the studio

was occupied by ITV’s Stars In Their Eyes. “Once a

production is in, they are in for the duration. They

can then really concentrate on the content rather

than on the mechanics,” he adds.

Other recent projects under its belt is post work

for Strictly Come Dancing, It Takes Two, Tumble

and Children in Need. John O’Callaghan, head of

studios and post production, explains: “We’ve built

our post rooms around projects. We did the Winter

Paralympics across the road. We did the studio bit

for Sunset + Vine for Channel 4 and built edits all

around it and then took the kit out afterwards.”

Highlighting the advantages of being able to

offer studio space and post services on the same

site, David Conway, managing director, says: “Not

many people are doing it and it differentiates us

from the Soho fixed model. It suits a lot of people

for efficiency reasons to be on the same site or

near to their studio.”

Feature26 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

Uncovering the magic of post and restoration

Melanie Dayasena-Lowe met the executive team at BBC Studios and Post Production to take a behind the scenes tour of its facilities in Elstree and South Ruislip since its move from the iconic Television Centre

BBC S&PP’s Digital Media Services business has been working on the restoration of Miss Marple

A diverse portfolioBBC S&PP has a 50/50 split between handling BBC

projects and those for other customers. “Year on

year, it depends on the mix of shows we win and it

depends if you measure it on volume (number of

shows) or value (revenue),” adds Conway.

So how do they make it clear to the industry

that they aren’t solely a BBC facility? “If you

go back four years or so, there was a bit more

uncertainty but now I think it is clear, particularly

that we do a lot for Channel 4, ITV and Sky and

people are much more aware. We would like to

get the message out more that we are offering

post production to a variety of customers,” explains

John O’Callaghan, head of communications.

When it comes to bidding for work on BBC

programmes, BBC S&PP bids the same as any

other company would. O’Callaghan adds: “Even

with the BBC work, we do generally have to pitch

and fight for every bit of work we get.”

The BBC Elstree site contains Elstree Studio D

while at Elstree Studios BBC S&PP takes up about

50 per cent of the site and manages Stages 8

and 9 with access to George Lucas Stages 1 and

2. It has also designed and installed permanent

HD galleries at the George Lucas Stages

(15,000sqft) to support large-scale entertainment

productions. It’s now the biggest studio space in

Europe with permanent HD galleries. “In addition

to the stages we look after here, we have an

ancillary block comprising dressing rooms, green

rooms, production offices and storage areas for

scenery and lighting,” explains Lewis.

Stages 8 and 9 were refurbished between

Autumn 2012 and February 2013 before BBC

S&PP moved into the new site. Having invested

heavily to update the Elstree site, Stage 8 and

Stage 9 (7,500sqft HD studios) were transformed

with new laser levelled floors and permanent HD

galleries and improved dressing room facilities

for talent. This was done to ensure all the areas

are well equipped to host any size or type of

television production.

“At the same time we were also operating

studios back at Television Centre (TVC) so

we had a lot of shows there coming in that

we were still supporting. We had almost a

mobile satellite team coming here, shifting and

lifting kit out of TVC. Wherever possible from an

efficiency point of view and because the kit in

TVC was really good (the latest HD equipment),

we tried to reuse and repurpose what we

had already. It was a really busy period,”

says O’Callaghan.

Stage 8 has been home to Pointless while

Stage 9 has played host to Sweat the Small Stuff,

Celebrity Juice and Never Mind the Buzzcocks.

The gallery for Stage 9 consists of permanent

portacabins containing kit from TVC. Lewis

believes this is a much better offering compared

to the space you would have in an OB truck.

There are three control room galleries for Stage

8 (production, lighting and sound), which have

been transformed and kitted out with ex-TVC kit

since BBC S&PP moved in. Conway says the work

that needed to be done before they moved in

for the galleries wasn’t about purchasing kit but

was more about systems integration, which was

carried out by Dega Broadcast Systems along

with BBC S&PP’s in-house technical team.

Close to George Lucas Stage 2, home to

Strictly Come Dancing last year, and alongside

the area occupied by the Big Brother house, is


Feature

“We’re formulating a strategy to go back to TVC to make it a success while thinking about what the commercial model is here at Elstree Studios”

David Conway, BBC S&PP

The DMS business moved to the new permanent facility in South Ruislip in early 2013

David Conway: “It’s now me having to come up with a lot of blue sky thinking rather than just implementation”


a large expanse of land, which

Elstree Studios plans to expand

into. Supported by the Hertsmere

Borough Council, which owns the

Elstree Studios site, it is rumoured

that plans are afoot to build a

brand new set of stages as well

as ancillary spaces like additional

dressing rooms. “The local

authority are really behind it and

want to expand the site further

into a bigger production village,”

comments Lewis.

New leadershipWith so much activity for BBC

S&PP, it’s been a busy couple of

months for Conway since taking

over the helm at the commercial

subsidiary in October 2014.

With an investment banking

background, he had previously

served on the company board

as a non-executive director, while

working as the BBC’s head of

investment and major projects in

BBC Corporate Finance. Prior to

becoming MD he had been chief

operating officer for BBC S&PP.

“As COO I had a broad sense

of the whole business and

headed up the business support

side of things.”

When asked how his new role

differs, Conway remarks: “It’s not

radically different. Clearly I was

very familiar with the business.

When we were looking at

strategic and commercial issues

I was heavily involved. It’s now

me having to come up with a lot

of blue sky thinking rather than

just implementation. It’s been an

interesting couple of months and

it’s such a vibrant time of the year

because of the volume of studio

shows. It has been an exciting

time to take over.”

So, what are his ambitions for

the company moving forward?

“There’s some pretty ambitious

things we need to do over the next

couple of years. We’ve still got to

take the studios business back to

TVC or reopen TVC so we have to

make that a commercial success.

“We’ve got to think about

what we’re going to retain here

at Elstree Studios because we

will retain some level of presence

here. We’re formulating a strategy

to go back to TVC to make it a

success while thinking about what

the commercial model is here at

Elstree Studios.”

The redevelopment of TVC is

underway and it’s starting to look

like a building site, according to

Conway. The designs are fully

approved and the strip out work

has begun. “It’s really taking

shape. We, and the developers

Stanhope, are getting excited

about the plans for the wider site.

They’ve locked in some other

anchor tenants like Soho House.”

BBC S&PP designed and installed permanent HD galleries at the George Lucas Stages (15,000sqft) to support large-scale entertainment productions

Creative media hubO’Callaghan adds: “There’s a real aspiration for it

to be a creative media hub. I wouldn’t be surprised

if you see productions cluster around there too.

There’s a lot of affection for the building.”

The plan is for BBC S&PP to go back to TVC in

2017. BBC Worldwide is expected to be the first to

return there in spring 2015.

As well as looking at what’s already on the

agenda, Conway is conscious that he also needs to

look at other growth opportunities over and above

its existing capacity.

“It doesn’t just apply to what you’ve seen

here but also in our Digital Media Services (DMS)

business. While it’s easy to understand how you

grow a studios business, DMS is a constantly

evolving area because media types and

formats are constantly evolving. Because it’s

a technology business, DMS has to adapt

all the time.”

Dedicated facilitySo next stop: South Ruislip to see BBC Studios

and Post Production’s Digital Media Services

facility firsthand. The DMS business moved to

the new permanent facility in early 2013 and

it will remain there with no plans to move

back to TVC.

And how do the two parts of the business in

Elstree and South Ruislip interact? That was a

question for Charles Tugendhat, director of DMS.

“People who are making programmes in studios,

even if it’s the same companies [Endemol,

Freemantle] are not necessarily the same people

making decisions about archiving or tape

digitisation. We often end up talking to the same

company and it’s only at the David Conway

level that he might be talking to someone who

has a view across both.

“There are a number of opportunities where our

skills come together. In particular, that’s around

the edit village, managed services of a post

production type nature.”

Clive Hodge, the current head of operations

for DMS, adds: “Studio technology is very

different from film restoration technology. We

each have our own experts in those areas.

There’s a small area in the middle where we

have an interest in the same thing, for instance

with file-based delivery. We’re pooling our

knowledge with a set of people who are experts

at file-based delivery. We have complementary

technologies so we can compare and contrast

different tools for the same job.”

Tugendhat, who is new to the BBC and has

previously worked for EMI Music, stresses the

wealth of expertise and knowledge across the

Feature TVBEurope 29March 2015 www.tvbeurope.com

“Even with the BBC work, we do generally have to pitch and fight for

every bit of work we get” John O’Callaghan,

BBC S&PP

www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

Feature30 TVBEurope

team. Hodge, one of their most experienced staff

members, is leaving at the end of March 2015 and

will be succeeded by Keith Nicholas who has over

20 years experience in broadcast having worked

for the BBC, Walt Disney and MTV. “I hope to bring

my perspective on different areas I’ve worked in

because I’ve worked for distributors, broadcasters,

the BBC and facilities companies,” explains Nicholas.

When asked how the new job is going, he quips:

“It’s like a wardrobe of shoes that you’ve previously

worn. Everything we do here are things that I’ve

worked on before.”

Another experienced member of the team is

Kevin Shaw who is lead technologist and has 20

years experience as a colourist and in restoration.

DMS operates at all levels across the value

chain for media assets with a particular

strength in film restoration and large scale

digitisation activities.

Tugendhat highlights some of the services

they provide. For instance, DMS provides a

tape duplication service for BBC Worldwide. “When

they sell programming abroad to customers that

can’t accept files, the content comes to us and

we produce a tape from it. We produce thousands

each month, it’s a large scale operation.”

In terms of optimisation, DMS can handle

content that requires some work to be done to it,

for example compliance (technical or editorial).

“It could be language, cutting to length or

removing ad breaks. Or it could be restoration.

As we go beyond HD, the quality may have

been acceptable 20 years ago but it’s no way

near acceptable now,” Tugendhat explains.

Secure storageOnce DMS has worked on the content, it is

returned to the customer or stored. The long term

security of the asset is an important aspect, he

adds. “I think there’s a general lack of awareness

on what the rate of loss is for formats that people

think are safe. A lot of people see drives and

DVDs as safe but in our experience that’s far

from being the case, probably even less safe

than tape. Tape also suffers from mould and

degradation. A proper storage service saves

you from that. You may have saved it on one file

format but there’s a change and a file format

goes out of favour. Suddenly you have these files

in an obsolete format and there may not even

be a way to read them anymore.”

Tugendhat continues: “With the move to

file-based delivery, if anybody requests a copy

of an asset which has been delivered to the

BBC as a file that sits on a database, we are the

mechanism that will reach that end customer.

They’ll request it from BBC Archives, they send

the file to us and we send it where it needs to

go. Our job is making sure it gets to customers

in the right way.”

The team at DMS are very proud of having

a dedicated facility that is designed for their

specific activity. “If you draw on the distinctions

between the TVC infrastructure compared to the

structure based around data flows that we’ve

got today, it is such a step forward,” he remarks.

Lift and shiftDMS is also an expert in restoring old machines

and keeping them running. “For a lot of them you

can no longer buy spare parts from manufacturers

so you’re having to cannabilise machines. We

have the expertise to bend working machines to

play tapes that were never recorded properly in

the first place,” he explains.

Ex-TVC kit was brought over to the new site and

Hodge describes the brief as “lift and shift”. “Two

years on we’ve added hosting and storage which

is new to us here. The main benefit was to leave

behind 20 years of infrastructure and cleanse the

operation of all the old technology, which was

unreliable or stopping us from doing what we want

to do. We were based on four different floors in

three different buildings and while technically that

was ok it was a challenge even for communication

between staff.”

The Rank-Cintel MK III machine brought over

from TVC, dating back to the late 1980s, was

retained for handling small formats such as

8mm and 9.5mm. The team says it can produce

better results and is more versatile than modern

equipment. It has also been modified over the

years to do things it was never intended to do. It

is even used to handle people’s home movies.

Walking around the South Ruislip facility, it is

clear that DMS’ portfolio is extremely varied.

Its work includes restoring footage of Winston

Churchill’s funeral for the BBC and the restoration

of Miss Marple for BBC Worldwide’s DVD and Blu-

ray release in North America.

In terms of growth plans for DMS, it has already

invested in the storage side of its business. “If we’re

digitising people’s assets, it makes sense we then

store it in the right way. Building that up as a service

in its own right is important,” says Tugendhat. “We

also want to expand our customer base.”

Nicholas agrees: “The growth part of our

business is doing work with third parties, not for

the BBC. It has been very good work but we

would like to offer more of those services to third

parties. There is a wealth of work to be done to

get content ready for broadcast and many

other platforms that customers want to distribute

their media on.”

“We have the expertise to bend working machines to play tapes that were never

recorded properly in the first place” Charles Tugendhat, DMS

BBC S&PP provided full studio and post production services for the ten year anniversary and 12th series of Strictly Come Dancing

Charles Tugendhat: “If we’re digitising

people’s assets, it makes sense we then store it in the

right way”


As DVD sales plummet, film and TV

producers around the world are

increasingly shifting to various Electronic

Sell Through (EST) services in order to try and

limit their revenue loss. One of the most

promising propositions out there is the Ultraviolet

digital locker system for electronic sell-through.

A standard endorsed by most of the American

studios – with the exception of Disney, which

has launched its own proprietary system – the

UV service is meant to enable consumers to

buy digital content stocked on a central

cloud, which they can access from a variety

of devices using a redeem code. Customers

buy a digital version of any designated UV title

available on a physical disc, and at the same

time acquire rights to stream, download and

share the cloud-based content with up to five

family members.

Launched several years ago in the USA, the

service has also started up across Europe. It

launched towards the end of 2013 in France and

a little more than a year later, according to figures

released by the Digital Entertainment Ecosystem

(DECE), the consortium that supports the system,

it numbers 116,000 account holders, with an

average of 4.1 rights per account user, which

means that each user has either downloaded

or streamed an average of four films or TV series

during 2014. According to Yves Caillaud, Europe

region managing director for the DECE: “The

usage per account holder in France is high for

a service that started only a year ago. It took

two years to reach such levels in the USA and

in Germany, where the system was launched

around the same time as in France, the rate is of

an average of 3.3 rights per account holder.”

That said, the number of account holders in

France remains lower than elsewhere in Europe.

The UK is, by far, the fastest growing market in the

region, numbering 1.54 million active Ultraviolet

accounts and in Germany, Switzerland and

Austria, UV accounts have topped 223,000,

nearly double the gaul take-up.

For Caillaud, France’s slower adoption rate

is due, in part, to the lack of a widespread and

comprehensive number of UV titles. Unlike the UK,

where Talk Talk’s streaming service Blinkbox [then

owned by Tesco] launched its own Ultraviolet

offer alongside Sainsbury’s Entertainment and

Dixons’ Cinemanow, in the weeks leading up to

Christmas, France’s retail stores have been slower

on the uptake. But Caillaud has high hopes that

this will improve since Carrefour just announced

its own Ultraviolet video-on-demand (VoD)

service, Nolim films, which launched in

late January.

Ease of use remains an issue, and a number

of potential partners have voiced concerns over

the complexity of the system. But, according

to Caillaud, these concerns have now been

addressed and the service has greatly improved

since it first launched.

Make or break time for Ultraviolet in France

The EST cloud-based and non-proprietary service is making slow but steady headway in the French market and should gain momentum now that Carrefour has come onboard and launched Nolim Films. By Catherine Wright

Les Editions Montparnasse, an independent

DVD distributor, has launched its

own VoD service

“We have made it much easier for customers

to access their content library from their set-top

boxes. The service is much more fl exible than it

was when it fi rst launched. For instance, in the

beginning, users had to enter their redeem code

twice to access the content. Now all they have

to do is enter it once from a special page. We

have also relaxed the parental control features

that were virtually impossible to implement in a

set-top box environment.”

Another problem is the lack of French titles.

The system has yet to be endorsed by gaul content

owners. “They were waiting for a large retail store

to come onboard before committing to the

service,” Caillaud justifi es. With Carrefour’s own UV

store up and running, it is likely that a number of big

French players could now become involved.

For Les Editions Montparnasse, an independent

DVD distributor that has launched its own VoD

service, Les Manufactures, there are other reasons

for not signing up to the system. The company’s

founder and CEO Renaud Delourme, who also

heads l’UNEVI (Union de l’édition numérique

et vidéographique indépendante), a lobbying

organisation representing small independent

distributors, is rather scathing: “Most of the small to

medium independent companies like ours have

rejected UV as a viable alternative. The cost of

coming onboard is too high for us and we don’t

always own both VoD and DVD rights for all our

titles, which is a prerequisite for UV.”

Like other small French companies, Les Editions

Montparnasse has seen its revenue plummet as a

result of collapsing DVD and Blu-Ray sales. The high

defi nition format never took off in France and hardly

ever made up for the decline in DVD sales. Recent

fi gures released by the CNC – a sort of French BFI,

but much better fi nanced – show that global video

sales in France plunged by 14 per cent in 2014, with

DVD discs dropping by 14.2 per cent and Blu-Ray by

O.6 per cent. This is a collapse bound to gain speed

as new enticing streaming services hit the market.

Much awaited, Netfl ix started up in France

last September amid plenty of controversy.

Headquartered in Amsterdam, it avoids paying

taxes which go towards subsidising French fi lms

and TV series – a much-criticised strategy in the

country of the ‘Exception Culturelle’. Gaul rulers

have, since the end of the Second World War,

protected French culture and fi lms in particular

against English-speaking competitors, through

a series of complex tax and quota measures.

However, the American streaming service has

announced that it is producing a French drama

series called Marseilles in an attempt to woo gaul

politicians, producers and customers. The service

is available on telco Bouygue’s set-top box for a

price ranging from €8 to €12 per month. Crucially,

Netfl ix’s service does not include its fl agship series

House of Cards, which, in France, remains a Canal

Plus exclusive. But it is nevertheless bound to

seduce a wide number of customers. According to

recent press reports, it managed to attract 100,000

gaul customers in the fi rst couple of weeks after

the launch, mere estimates that the American

company will not confi rm. But even if it did, they

should be put into context: quite a few subscribers

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were bound to be enticed by the free one-

month trial offer Netflix trumpeted with its massive

marketing clout. A more relevant figure would be

the service’s churn rate at least a couple of months

after launch which is, of course, totally confidential.

According to Caillaud, Netflix’s subscription-

based VoD service does not compete directly

with Ultraviolet and is therefore not a huge threat.

“French legislation has imposed a set of rules called

Chronologie des médias that every content retailer,

even Netflix, has to respect. For subscription-based

streaming services, there is a 36-month delay

between the theatrical release of films and what

they can sell. That means that unlike Ultraviolet, it

cannot show recent movies,” he explains.

As the Ultraviolet service is an electronic sell-

through proposition, coupled with the buying of a

physical disc, it can show films four months after their

theatrical release, according to French legislation.

The same 36-month rule applies to CanalPlay,

Canal Plus’ own streaming subscription-based

service. The French broadcaster launched it at least

four years before Netflix started its own, in fairly low-

key fashion. It numbers around 520,000 subscribers.

Arguably, the most serious competition comes

from iTunes, Apple’s own proprietary electronic

sell-through service.

The Store, which initially sold only music,

launched its video streaming and EST service

across the French market in 2006. Subscribers can

access content from Pixar, Disney or Lionsgate and,

more importantly, French content owners like TF1:

it boasts up to 85,000 films and 300,000 TV series,

including gems like True Detective.

But as Apple will not release any figures, the

number of subscribers is hard to estimate. Most

sources evaluate it to be well above the one

million mark.

When UV first launched, some concerns were

also raised over the sharing of data in the cloud,

as the service is non-proprietary, contrary to iTunes.

But according to Caillaud, such fears were quickly

abated. “Very little data is shared on the cloud and

none of it is of a sensitive nature. No credit card

numbers, for instance. Basically, all that is shared is

the customer’s name and his or her list of films.”

It is therefore make or break time for Ultraviolet

in France: either gaul content owners, encouraged

by the Carrefour launch, and the efforts made

by the DECE to simplify and reduce the costs of

the system, come onboard, or they remain on the

sidelines and lose out on a opportunity to move

from physical to digital without too much revenue

loss. But if they don’t make up their minds very

fast, UV will have little chance to establish itself in

France. In order to attract customers here, you

have to offer French content, a rule that even the

Netflix’s of this world can’t ignore.

Les Editions Montparnasse founder and CEO, Renaud Delourme

Yves Caillaud, Europe region managing director, DECE


Good news for consumer electronics (CE)

firms. Global spend is on the rise, up one

per cent on 2013 to just over $1 trillion,

estimates the Consumer Electronics Association

(CEA). Further good news is that UHD displays

are shifting ahead of expectations, comprising

11 per cent of global sales in 2015 (Futuresource

Consulting), so it was no surprise to see every

brand majoring on 4K sets at the CES show.

In recent years, manufacturers have struggled

to find margin on TV screens and the concern with

4K was whether consumers would actually see

the benefits of buying new screens. The dominant

argument since CES 2014 has been the call for

better looking pixels, not just more of them. This call

has been heeded by the formation of the UHD

Alliance, a global coalition of film studios (Warner

Bros, Fox, Walt Disney), TV brands (LG, Sony) and

tech companies (Dolby, Technicolor) plus Netflix to

create standards for premium UHD. Criteria includes

high dynamic range (HDR), wider colour gamut and

immersive 3D audio although the exact specifications

need thrashing out in the coming months.

“What the studios are realising is that now

there’s a way to deliver titles at a level of quality

representative of what people want to see,” Roland

Vlaicu, VP of consumer imaging, Dolby told the

panel session HDR: Hollywood’s New Creative Tool.

HDR comes to the foreDolby has been one of the leaders in this space

with HDR post process Dolby Vision, which has

been used to remaster a number of titles on

the FilmLight Baselight system including Edge of

Tomorrow and The Lego Movie. While these can

be streamed from services like M-Go or Netflix,

Panasonic’s prototype of the first 4K Blu-Ray

player was another brick in the wall of a 4K

home ecosystem.

There were warnings that wider adoption

of UHD Alliance specifications will face

challenges in implementation across the

production pipeline and at retail.

“Existing 4K cameras can capture HDR in

single exposures but what’s not in place is

colour grading and the whole post production

and distribution chain,” said Arris engineering

fellow, Sean McCarthy. “How do you insert

SDR (standard dynamic range) content like

advertising into a HDR programme? How does

a TV know the content has switched? If there is

a big difference in brightness how quickly does

the eye adapt?”

TVBEurope at CES 2015 Adrian Pennington headed over to Las Vegas to check out the latest trends at this year’s International Consumer Electronics Show (CES)

BK Yoon, co-CEO, Samsung

Feature


He warned: “There will be confusion in the

market which could slow down purchases if the

communication isn’t thought through.”

Scott Mirer, VP, device partner ecosystem at

Netflix, agreed: “HDR is hard to communicate

to consumers and it has nothing to do with

the technology. We don’t have experience

with how to talk about HDR’s benefits to

consumers and we don’t have convergence

on how to implement it.”

Mark Turner, VP of partnership relations

and business development for Technicolor,

declared a need to establish UHD standards.

“When it comes to colour space, how

high is HDR and how wide is wide colour

gamut? How do we make sure it’s an

interoperable standard? There’s a lot of work

to be done.”

CES 2015 showed that UHD has definitively

arrived as a display format. Overall, screens

are getting thinner, larger (average screen

size worldwide is now 41-inches compared to

33-inches in 2008) and richer in contrast and

colour as well as resolution. Lacking last year,

but prevalent in 2015 ranges, are HDMI 2.0 and

HEVC, both technical requirements for delivering

richer on-screen pixels.

“Production is shifting over from 1080p and

2016 will be the inflection point,” noted Steve

Koenig, director of industry analysis, CEA. “It may

even be difficult to find a 1080p set as the price

premium for 1080p is small.”

It is to be hoped that the Alliance expands

to incorporate others – notably Chinese TV

makers who are a growing influence – although

as Futuresource Consulting’s senior market

analyst Jack Wetherill observed, the Alliance

can be seen as an attempt to counter the

Chinese by differentiating product from what

is seen as inferior quality, and certainly

cheaper, screens.

“Chinese brands are posing questions for

the industry, forcing Korean and Japanese

brands to rethink strategies,” said Wetherill.

Chinese brands including Skyworth, Hisense, TP

Vision grew more than 20 per cent in 2014. The

Chinese domestic market alone is worth over

20 per cent of the global flatscreen market.

2015 will see TVBEurope attend and cover

more of the key events on the broadcast

media industry calendar. Following the

successful redesign of TVBEurope, we

have developed a more comprehensive

list of features for each issue over the

coming year, and will be launching a

dedicated section covering the latest

developments in OTT, multiscreen, and

TV Everywhere: TVBEverywhere. Our

Opinion and Analysis and Features

sections will deliver the big stories

every month; Workflow will continue

our bedrock coverage of UHD, 4K, IT/

IP infrastructures, and pre and post

production insights; and our Business

section will provide a regualr analysis

of the marketplace, and all of the key

M&A activity. Our Audio for Broadcast

coverage will now be present in every

issue and major sports/live broadcast

events will be reported on throughout

the year.

For all advertising and sponsorship

opportunities, contact the sales team:

Europe

Ben Ewles: +44 (0) 20 7354 6000,

[email protected], or

Richard Carr: +44 (0) 20 7354 6000,

[email protected],

USA

Mike Mitchell +1 631 673 0072,

[email protected]

EDITORIAL PLANNER 2015

Issue Date Exhibitions/ Events Coverage FeatureAudio for

BroadcastSports/Live broadcast

April• BVE 2015

• NAB 2015 show issue

• Beyond HD: 4K and UHD challenges

• Virtual sets forum• UHD audio

May

• NAB review

• TVBE conference review

• Satellite TV focus

• Audio for broadcast special

• Sound mixers forum

• Sound

mixers forum• 2015 UK election

June• Angacom focus

• TV Connect insights

• OTT multiscreen

• Acquisition focus: lighting for TV

• Audio & out-

side broadcast• Summer of sport OB focus

July• Channel in a box forum

• Broadcast 2020: visions of the future

August • IBC preview

• Broadcast graphics forum

• IBC product preview• Mics/ mon-

itors/ consoles• Wimbledon 2015

September • IBC show issue• Quality control forum

• IBC show issue: product showcase

October• Audio for broadcast special

• IP technology forum

• Broadcast

audio feature

November • TVBAwards • Acquisition focus: all encompassing

• Transcoding forum• Rugby World Cup 2015

December• Media Asset Management forum

• Archiving and storage roundtable

Liquid Image’s Ego LS 800 wearable cam will record HD at 30fps, while simultaneously live broadcasting over Verizon’s LTE network


Feature

Japan’s Toshiba, absent of new UHD models,

could be a casualty.

Aside from remastered movies, 4K content

announcements were thin on the ground. DishTV’s

unveiled a service in the US; Netflix announced

support for HDR later this year; and Sony declared

that all its TV shows are either currently being shot in

4K or “will be shot in 4K soon.”

Sharp, Panasonic and LG were showing

8K screens, targeted more at the Japanese

domestic market where 8K broadcasts tests

are set to begin next year.

Quantum dots for contrastOther initiatives to deliver greater on-screen

contrast and colour included displays with

Quantum Dot technology. It seems manufacturers

have yet to crack the cost of producing OLEDs

and are placing their bets instead on QD LCD

displays which work by inserting a layer of

nanoparticles between a display’s backlight and

colour filters. The result is much improved contrasts

and a wider colour gamut at a fraction of the cost

of OLED. However, viewers won’t see the benefit

while content is still produced to match the old

Rec. 709 standard. Upscaling technology in QD

sets is a workaround although the results can look

unnatural and over saturated. One of the goals

of the UHD Alliance is to standardise around Rec.

2020 but until content is produced in that format,

a TV’s ability to display extra colour gamut will

be wasted.

Sharp had another solution. Its self-titled

Beyond 4K 80-inch set uses a pixel-splitting

technique that, when applied to 4K resolution,

is claimed to create 66 million subpixels,

which is 42 million more than a standard 4K

set. “It approaches 8K resolution,” claimed

Sharp’s US marketing chief, Jim Sanduski, while

cinematographer Wally Pfister (The Dark Knight)

talked about how the technology shows off his

work the way it is meant to be viewed.

OLED wasn’t entirely absent. Panasonic had

an impressive OLED prototype and LG is boldly

putting $600 million into OLED development

at the same time as releasing sets with QD. Its

65-inch Art Slim, a 4K OLED curved TV, was a

showstopper - it weighs only 35 pounds and is as

thin as a smartphone. “Unless OLED costs come

down dramatically, QD will suffice,” said Wetherill.

It’s worth noting the presence of

autostereoscopic TV. In particular, Stream TV

Networks has made deals with Izon and Cello

Electronics to add its glasses-free 3D tech to

their TV product lines. “We’ve been waiting for

4K panels as they have 8 million pixels and we

can use those extra pixels to create depth and

separation of images for glasses-free-3D viewing,”

explained CEO Mathu Rajan.

Smart TV remained a key theme albeit with less

of a fanfare than previously. Approaches vary. In

recent months some of the leading brands, like

Sony, Philips and Sharp have adopted Google’s

Android TV platform while LG and Panasonic

continue to use Mozilla’s Firefox.

“With Googlecast, you can throw content

from the mobile device to the TV and even have

an app for your smartwatch so you can

control the TV from your wrist,” explained

Sony COO Mike Fasulo.

Samsung UHD TVs are based on the Tizen

OS, which is also used in its smartphones and

would allow users to sync and share content

between Tizen devices via Wi-Fi. “This is a bold

‘Analyst IDC reckons the global Internet of Things market will exceed $7 trillion

by 2020’


and potentially expensive investment, but they

could reap the rewards if they are able to align

these operating systems with that of their mobile

phones,” stated Wetherill.

VR camera techMuch in the way CE vendors attempted to seed

content into the 3D space by retailing affordable

3D video cameras, so VR hardware developers

need content to encourage sales.

Several consumer friendly 360-degree video

cameras have been released recently including

the Giroptic 360cam, Geonaute, Ricoh Theta,

VSN Mobil V.360 and Kodak Pixpro SP360. To the

mix add Samsung Project Beyond, a camera

designed to work with the Samsung Gear VR

headset, which captures 360-degree video in 3D.

IC Real Tech’s Allie camera can create a

720-degree view by stitching two 360-degree

camera feeds together. The Allie Play, Home

and Pro video duel lens cameras cost from

$500 to $3,000 and can stream live footage

or record two hours of video to an SD card,

or the cloud.

Sony went after GoPro with the FDR-X1000V

action camera, which shoots 4K (3,840 x 2,160) at

30fps from a fixed 170-degree Zeiss Tessar lens. It’s

on sale in March for £328 along with a cheaper

HD version, the HDR-AS200V.

Liquid Image’s Ego LS 800 wearable cam will

record HD at 30fps, while simultaneously live

broadcasting over Verizon’s LTE network. Other

action cams can live-stream video over Wi-Fi.

The camera plus LTE unit costs £200 and is only

available in the US.

Drones incidentally, continue to trend, with sales

approaching 425,000 and $130 million in revenue in

2015 and sales expected to top $1 billion by 2018.

A wearables mania“This time next year will be the beginning of

the wearables mania,” suggested CEA’s director

of business intelligence Jack Cutts.

In 2013, the wearable market was 0.5 per cent

of total CE market revenue, valued at $1 billion.

“By the end of 2015, we expect it to be 2.3 per cent

of the total market worth $5.1 billon,” he added.

Most of this business is in the fitness sector but

smartwatches (often with a fitness element) are

quickly catching up. Apple’s imminent release

of a smartwatch is highly anticipated.

Smart eyewear is predicted to show 10x

growth to 2018, outpacing fitness trackers.

“Smart eyewear will eventually rule CE

wearables,” predicted Cutts and by CES

2016 “we’ll just be getting to where virtual

reality takes off.”

Sony plans to mass produce its new OLED-based

SmartEyeglass. The prototype, developed by

Sony Mobile, is independent of the Sony group

developing the Morpheus VR head mounted

display. It uses two forward-facing projectors built

into see-through glasses to overlay augmented

reality video and data. It can only display eight

shades of green at 419 x 128 pixels but even

at that low resolution, text displays clearly. The

glasses have a forward-facing camera for

recording images as well as use by Android apps.

Epson’s Moverio BT-200 run Android 4.0 from a

wired smartphone-like controller and provide a

full-colour image in the centre of the user’s field

of view. While not yet commercially available,

Epson was inviting developers to build an AR

library for the product and demoed versions

equipped with video games and Netflix.

These types of AR glasses provide a solution

between Google Glass and the fully immersive VR

experience provided by devices like Oculus Rift.

Bizarrely, wearables worn inside the body

represent an untapped market. “Implantable

technologies is something we should keep an

eye on,” Cutts suggested.

“Another new frontier is smart fabrics. We’re

starting to see this pop up, but it’ll be more than

five years for this to be a mass market.”

Internet of Things needs a meaningThe wearables category is part of a much

larger fabric of sensorised objects loosely

called the Internet of Things (IoT). By some

accounts it’s a huge untapped opportunity.

Analyst IDC reckons the global IoT market

will exceed $7 trillion by 2020, up from

$1.9 trillion in 2013.

There were keynotes harping on the theme.

Intel CEO Brian Krzanich said: “The last time we

saw a wave of change this big was 20 years ago

today, in 1995, with a revolution in consumer

computing with the Pentium processor and first

commercial browsers.”

Characteristics of the current revolution

include computers that will interact in three-

dimensional space, see and hear using depth,

sound and facial recognition sensors, and

become wire-free.

Samsung plans to IoT-enable all of its hardware

by 2020. It is even developing a sensor that can

distinguish between 20 different scents.

“The TV in the house will work as a hub for IoT,”

said co-CEO BK Yoon. “It will emerge as a very

important device in the lives of consumers.”

There are a number of standards bodies

looking to join up the smart home. They include

Apple Homekit, Thread (Samsung and Nest)

and All Joyn (Qualcomm) but there is no

single standard covering all parts of the chain

from sensor to cloud. Inevitably, some of this

will consolidate.

Shawn Dubravac, CEA chief economist, said,

“the focus should be on what is technologically

meaningful. Should we digitise it? How should

we use it? The challenge is to make sure that the

information influences behaviour.”

Look out for a more in-depth look at the IoT

and what it means to the TV and service provider

industry in a future edition of TVBEurope.

Drones continue to trend with sales expected to top $1 billion by 2018

“Another new frontier is smart fabrics. We’re starting to see this pop up, but

it’ll be more than five years for this to be a mass market”

Jack Cutts, Consumer Electronics Association

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EXHIBITS-ONLYPASS CODE

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Now Co-located:

The commitment to become a global

provider was possibly the strongest message

from the recent Netfl ix investors’call, where

Reed Hastings and Ted Sarandos highlighted the

company’s growth strategy. The interest of Netfl ix

for markets outside the US, not only Europe but

also emerging markets other than LATAM where

it is already available, shows that there is global

potential for paid OTT video, subscription-based

video on demand (SVoD) and transactional

video on demand (TVoD).

Our research into the potential of emerging

markets regions for paid OTT video suggests

that many of the hurdles to legal, paid OTT video

development – widespread piracy, low credit

card penetration and consumer familiarity with

online payments, and the poor performance of

broadband networks – have been overestimated.

For example, while credit card has been a

challenge for Netfl ix in LATAM, the company has

successfully introduced alternative payment

methods such as prepaid cards. In many markets,

fi xed broadband speeds have also become less of

an issue, thanks to the bandwidth-saving effi ciencies

generated by CDNs, caching and ABR. Furthermore,

in some emerging markets such as Russia and China,

but also in the major urban areas of Brazil, telcos

have been undergoing extensive fi bre deployments

for some time, pushing average connection speeds

to levels that are often higher than developed

economies in Southern Europe.

In a recent study, we have forecasted OTT SVoD

to grow from 19 million accounts in 2014 to 103

million accounts in 2019 across the emerging market

regions of LATAM, Africa and the Middle East,

Central and Eastern Europe and America APAC.

While advertising-funded OTT video will remain

prevalent across these territories, we are witnessing

the emergence of hybrid models whereby

advertising-funded content serves to increase

reach and penetration, and premium content is

delivered via SVoD and TVoD to boost monetisation

and futureproof the business models. In household

penetration terms, we believe that some kind of

OTT SVoD will be in use in 6.4 per cent of emerging

market households by 2019. We expect paid OTT

revenue (SVoD and TVoD) in emerging markets to

expand from $1.2 billion in 2014, or only 2.3 per cent

of pay-TV revenue, to $6 billion in 2019, or 9.2 per

cent of pay-TV revenue. Across emerging markets,

there is $18.8 billion up for grabs in 2015-2019 for local

and international providers.

China, Russia, Brazil and Mexico offer the most

scale and growth potential. These are the markets

that also offer the most promising environments for

the formation of sizeable online video audiences,

and offer the most potential to segment offers. In

addition, regions that are linguistically uniform, such

as LATAM and to a lesser extent the Middle East,

will provide signifi cant potential for OTT providers to

target multiple markets that are culturally close.

In regional terms, starting from a higher base,

LATAM markets will reach the highest household

penetration levels in 2019 (Mexico 17 per cent,

Brazil 14 per cent). Emerging APAC will also see

signifi cant traction, from one per cent of households

in 2014 to seven per cent in 2019. Growth in APAC

will be driven by China where the local OTTs will

increasingly introduce SVoD options for high quality

of experience and premium/HD content, with the

objective to drive monetisation and futureproof

business models. For China, we expect SVoD

penetration to increase from seven per cent in 2014

to 13 per cent of households in 2019. Given this

potential, it is not surprising that Netfl ix has expressed

an interest in entering China. In spite of high barriers

to entry, Netfl ix admitted that it would like to

operate a small service in the country centred on its

original and other globally-licensed content.

A more immediate opportunity for Netfl ix, and for

other cross-national providers operating in Europe

(i.e. Wuaki TV), may be Eastern Europe. Poland

and Russia offer a good environment with plenty

of fi bre in the ground. These markets are already

seeing good traction in the OTT space. In Poland,

the AVoD/TVoD Ipla passed four million users,

while Russia’s AVoD IVI, which has TVoD and SVoD

options for premium content, has one of the largest

customer bases among OTTs worldwide, with a

monthly audience of 12 million to 16 million unique

users. The Middle East has also been rumoured as a

target region for a Netfl ix entry for some time.

The high cost of content means that OTT

business models relying on advertising revenue

streams have become diffi cult to sustain globally.

As consumer demand for premium

content anytime and anywhere increases

in emerging markets, paid OTT services will

become more commonplace.


TVBEverywhere

Daniele Tricarico, senior analyst at Pyramid Research, explains how OTT providers are pushing paid services in emerging markets to futureproof their business models

Providers going OTT to futureproof business models

Forecasted emerging market* OTT SVoD growth Source: Pyramid Research: *LATAM, Africa and the Middle East, Central and Eastern Europe and America APAC

19 million accounts

103 million accounts

2014

2019

TVBEverywhere42 TVBEurope

Content distribution is taking on an

entirely different perspective as it moves

increasingly into the cloud, onto new

devices and firmly away from more traditional

broadcast channels and platforms. This presents a

challenge for all media organisations, broadcasters

and content delivery network operators who are

trying to meet customer needs, maintain their

competitiveness and commercial sustainability,

and scale their operational footprint to match the

requirements of a video-on-demand shaped future.

IPTV is increasingly becoming the distribution

channel of choice. A report released earlier

this year stated that paying IPTV subscribers

in Western Europe are set to overtake paying

satellite TV customers in 2018, while forecasting

that IPTV subscriptions will climb by 7.5 million (38

per cent) between 2013 and 2020.

This is no surprise given IPTV’s flexibility which

enables consumers to watch what they want, when

they want, on a wide range of devices from iPads

and Android tablets through to Google Glass, if

the latest predictions are to be believed. Media

organisations are readjusting their strategies by

adapting the content they offer to new mediums

while still ensuring value for advertisers.

One of the most significant factors is the

sustained demand for premium, high quality

content. Some operators, and increasingly

content producers, are building their own content

delivery networks (CDNs) using a software defined

networking (SDN) approach to meet demands. This

is set to grow as customers increasingly expect the

delivery of exceptional quality broadcasting.

Waiting in the wings is 4K, the much-hyped answer

to broadcast programming in ultra-high quality, but

there is still little indication when it will reach the mass-

market, and we may have to wait for the next major

international sporting event, such as the Olympics in

2016, to see it launched in earnest.

What is crucial is that whilst we as consumers

constantly strive for higher quality video delivered

on demand, with content producers attempting to

meet those demands, the pressure on the already

over-burdened global network infrastructure will

reach near-unsustainable levels.

Meeting the challengesThe FIFA World Cup last year is a perfect example

of how the video and broadcast landscape has

changed. For most leading CDN operators, it was

the biggest sporting event ever in terms of total

video traffic volume. For the broadcasters who

depend on the network to deliver jitter-free, high

quality video to customers, there is a real concern

that internet connections will be unable to support

future events attracting worldwide attention.

Not only do network providers have to guarantee

that the network is free from latency issues, but also

that the live action starts instantly on the customer’s

device of choice. Any delay could result in the

customer abandoning the service and migrating

to a competitor.

But content, particularly across international

networks, has to travel long distances - from the

original source in the data centre via the CDN,

through the ISP network, and eventually to the

customer. And if it is being syndicated, the content

publisher has to publish and distribute the content

from various parties which adds an additional

layer of complexity.

A customer’s own internet access is beyond

the control of content providers or operators, but

they can exercise control over other points in the

process by implementing effective solutions. Google

and Netflix are good examples of well managed

content delivery, but fellow providers could look

for inspiration in other, time-sensitive sectors,

like financial services, to see low-latency, high

bandwidth options in action.

Supporting business aims with connectivityContent providers should look at their business

objectives and how they can be met with

connectivity. How does connectivity influence

them, and what are the requirements of global

regulation? Managing costs and reducing risk are

also essential to determine the connectivity needed

for each content category.

CDNs delivering video content in different

languages and formats should ensure they have

their own connectivity profiles. The average latency

of a standard trans-Atlantic connection is 60-80ms,

which is fine for enterprise applications, but too slow

for media distribution.

It is challenging to ensure the infrastructure

between consumer locations, data centres

and partners is of a high enough standard, in

particular across multiple international locations.

Implementation of ‘Five-9s’ (99.999 per cent)

availability is challenging and resource-heavy if

in more than one country.

Another option is content delivery from

outsourcing. Outsourcing through high

performing CDNs such as Akamai, Amazon,

CloudFlare or Google is usually cost effective

and delivers unrivalled operational reliability,

whilst shortening the time-to-market for new

services and content developments.

Content providers in the US are increasingly

turning to pay-per-use models, which allows them

to pay for the actual bandwidth used, rather than

the capacity, but here in Europe legacy carriers

have found it difficult to set up billing systems

that accommodate this idea. As a result a hybrid

model is more common: 50 per cent of the peak

load dimensioned bandwidth is bought and the

actual usage is invoiced.

Connectivity should be right at the top of

the agenda for all IPTV, VoD and other content

delivery strategies.

If it supports the objectives of the business,

reduces risks, and is cost efficient, it will keep you

ahead of the game.

Anthony Kingsnorth, COO at Custom Connect, follows the shifting track of content distribution

‘Paying IPTV subscribers in Western Europe are set to overtake paying satellite

TV customers in 2018’

Understanding connectivity is the key to IPTV and VoD delivery

www.tvbeurope.com March 2015

Baumanis: As always it could be better, but in

general, projects foreseen for year 2014 were

implemented. Comparing with 2013, this is a

good sign showing investments fl owing in to

broadcast technology.

Burgess: Last year started slowly with several

projects being delayed, but towards the end we

did pick up a number of signifi cant orders for the

UK and overseas market. 2015 has started with a

very healthy order book.

Hughes: We had a very busy year, active on

projects in the UK and overseas. Demand is strong

here in the UK where we have been active on a

range of projects for ABS Broadcast, Arqiva, the

BBC, Intervideo, Trinity Broadcast Networks and a

very high profi le central London system which we

are not at liberty to talk about yet. We have also

seen a high activity level in the Middle East with

strong demand from customers around the region.

Kampe: Absolutely! We enriched our portfolio

to six business areas – outside broadcasting,

satcom, broadcast facilities, mobile surveillance

solutions, sport arena multimedia infrastructure,

as well as engineering and innovation services.

Besides our traditional strong core business of

building OB vans and SNGs, our new business

areas, sport arena multimedia infrastructure and

engineering services, started successfully and we

expect them to prosper.

Moore: Yes, we did see some improvement in

the market, and the number of projects being

discussed for 2015 has increased, so hopefully

we’ll see a continuing recovery in our sector.

Robinson: As always business is an ever

moving concept, and we have successfully


All systems go for 2015?Philip Stevens moderates this month’s forum looking at issues facing Systems Integrators

With a need to stay ahead of all the technological advances across the industry, Systems Integrators (SIs) are in a good position to keep a fi nger on the pulse of trends and developments. So, what challenges will 2015 bring forth for SIs? Will IP take off in a big way? To discuss these and other issues, we’ve brought together (in alphabetical order) Kalvis Baumanis, managing director of Hannu Pro; Steve Burgess, CTO, Megahertz; Jonathan Hughes, ATG Danmon’s head of system Integration; Rainer Kampe, managing director/CTO, Broadcast Solutions; Kevin Moore, managing director, Eurotek; Malcolm Robinson, director of operations, Broadcast Networks; Alex Shrank, systems architect, VSC Design; Tomas Vesely, broadcast project director, Visual Unity.

Forum

In the 2014 forum, most participants expressed confi dence for the year ahead. Did the last 12 months see the progress you envisaged?

Kalvis Baumanis, Hannu

Stephen Burgess, Megahertz


Forum

delivered a number of key projects

from playout systems to OB vehicles.

I think a lot of people used the

year to gain some ideas for budget

setting, as we have provided a

large number of quotations that

have not developed into projects.

I believe the industry itself is moving

through an interesting time as

we settle into HD broadcasting,

while still pushing technology and

innovation to continue to drive the

market place forward. The term

‘good enough’ seems to have

become more commonplace!

Shrank: Yes it did. Having been

awarded a place on the BBC

systems integration framework we

have subsequently been awarded

some contracts within this and we

have also been busy completing

other projects in the UK and overseas

for new and existing customers.

2014 saw an increase in the number

of ongoing support contracts that

we provide to customers. This is

becoming an increasingly important

part of our business and something

that more and more customers

expect from Systems Integrators

rather than the traditional model of

‘sign-off and handover’.

Vesely: My expectation for

the availability of more IP-based

technology was not fulfi lled, as the

product launches announced at

the beginning of the year were

mostly postponed.

Burgess: Upgrading existing systems

to HD is still a signifi cant part of our

business. But, at the same time, we

did see a number of orders for new

systems, where customers took a

decision that the upgrade path was

not economical, or the project is to

fulfi l a new business requirement.

Many projects are driven by national

and international events. In the UK,

the next is the general election.

Moore: In our market, it is a mix

of both. Most clients are still working

through the effects of the downturn,

so are spending as little as they can

on new technology, and upgrading

where possible. But in some areas

we are seeing moves to new

technology, particularly in OTT and

on-demand services.

Shrank: This will depend upon a

number of factors, such as where

they are in the technology cycle,

how new the current investment is,

and what is driving their business. If

a company is considering a major

refurbishment, then it is always sensible

to look at what technology is on the

horizon, but some customers may

be driven to adapt new technology

by immediate business needs. Most

customers will initially look to upgrade

if that will satisfy their medium term

requirements, but some may adopt

new technology if they are at the

point of a major reinvestment.

Baumanis: IP is very thrilling, but

clients want to be sure and see

it really working with the same

robustness as existing traditional

baseband implementations. Last

year was promising for IP, but in

reality there were no solutions to

really work. Hopefully next year will

bring more real ‘fruits’.

Burgess: Within the DSNG

market, IP is now the standard

with smaller trucks. Larger DSNGs

and OB trucks are still based on

traditional technology, although

all have an increasing amount of

IP connectivity and infrastructure.

We have customers looking at IP,

particularly when they are also

considering 4K. The absence of

agreed standards is limiting the

deployment of this technology.

Hughes: Clients are still opting

to purchase and install proven

technology, but they are looking

at the available upgrade paths

on new products to allow IP

connectivity.

Kampe: In the future, more and

more conventional devices will

be replaced by software, routers

will be exchanged by network

switches and complete systems will

be connected via network cables

– so IP will become a major part of

system integration. The demand

for reliable and safe running

systems will increase in the future.

Kevin Moore, Eurotek

Alex Shrank, VSC Design

Where technology is changing rapidly, are clients generally opting for upgrades or new installs?

IP technology is discussed a great deal at the moment. What are your clients requesting with regards to this technology?

“IP is very thrilling, but clients want to be sure and see it really working with

the same robustness as existing traditional baseband

implementations” Kalvis Baumanis,

Hannu

Currently, there is an element of uncertainty

towards the direction of the IP-shift and on the

consequences for our customers’ business. But

once these questions are being answered,

the advantages on costs, maintenance

and fl exibility will promote the market

breakthrough of IP. To be ahead of the

development a dedicated team at Broadcast

Solutions works solely on IP-technology.

Moore: As mentioned earlier, OTT and

second screen is a big topic, as are IPTV

distribution systems for in-house viewing and

signal distribution. We are also seeing quite

a lot of interest in IP for contribution and

distribution links.

Robinson: IP is full of nonsense at the

moment. In its basic form, it’s a point to

point transportation method which has

been around for a number of years, as a

full blown infrastructure it’s full of unknown

complications, but this is steadily becoming

a little less hazy. Give it time and we will see

all of these innovations naturally fi nd their

place. At this stage, why be the fi rst, what

does it really bring to your day-to-day job at

the moment? Sure it may have commercial

and operational benefi ts in the future, but so

far I have not seen this in a viable working

scenario. This said we are working with the

key players to ensure that when the solutions

are deemed fi t for purpose we are ready to

offer a professional, unbiased and

knowledgeable viewpoint to our customers,

enabling them to make informed decisions.

Shrank: High bandwidth fi le-based

connections, such as those between storage

systems and edit clients or servers have been

standard using IT platform technology. But

10GbE and 40GbE routing alongside baseband

3Gbs SDI signals and hybrid multiviewer inputs

and display handling is of key interest today

and this is where the leading question is

‘how are these individual sources actually

generated?’. AVB, as an interoperability

standard, makes clients then consider if their

network is AVB-enabled or if they need a major

infrastructure upgrade to handle it. The client’s

business sector, be it broadcaster, production

house or link service provider, defi nes how each

will evaluate the deployment of IP and the

ROI it can bring.

Vesely: We can defi nitely see an increase

in IP-based installations rather than traditional

audio-video base band, but still there are

enough conservative customers not fully

convinced to transition to IP, plus there are areas

where the technology is not yet available.

Baumanis: Delivery to different platforms would

be one of them. Nowadays every broadcaster

or operator implements OTT. For broadcast –

more integrated, affordable and easy-to-use

live production systems are in demand. In

general customers are asking for feature-rich,

all in one solutions.

Hughes: Software skills have become an

increasingly important aspect of the systems

integration business, and that demands a strong

understanding of the whole technical spectrum

from baseband video and audio right through to

media fi le processing and IP bridging. We also fi nd

ourselves asked to work in partnership with customers

much earlier in the planning process than used to

be the case, explaining the relative operational and

technical merits of the various workfl ow options.

Kampe: High speed cameras are becoming

increasingly common in sports production. In

our portfolio we offer different solutions from the

traditional 3x up to systems allowing 10,000fps.

And, of course, we always ensure that these

technologies are integrated seamlessly into

the production fl ow.

Robinson: MAM and OTT services are currently

moving through some signifi cant innovations,

while cloud-based systems are pushing the

operational desires further and further and

making cost effective channels realistic.

Shrank: UHD baseband SDI handling,


Forum

Beyond IP, are there any particular technologies that are more in demand today than two years ago?

Malcolm Robinson, Broadcast Networks

Tomas Vesely, Visual Unity

Jonathan Hughes, ATG Danmon

Rainer Kampe, Broadcast Solutions

typically as Quad-link, is now a real

requirement. The cost of acquisition,

editing and local display of UHD is

not prohibitive, thus the adaption of

the more costly core infrastructure

to pass the required bandwith is a

real consideration.

Vesely: There is defi nitely a

boom of digital cameras used

for acquisition and as fi le-based

content is a reality it makes MAM

systems more demanding as well.

Baumanis: With 4K last year, it was

the same situation as IP – lots of

talk, but no real implementation.

Now, again, this has restarted and

we believe that this year a few

test channels replacing 3D will be

started. At the same time, these

customers will want to produce their

own 4K content.

Burgess: We have delivered a 4K

Links truck to a UK customer already

and expect orders for a couple

more 4K vehicles in the near future.

As mentioned earlier, the lack of

agreed standards is dampening

customers’ take up of 4K.

Hughes: 4K looks an attractive

investment option for new-start-

up camera crews or production

companies, but we have yet to

see any signifi cant interest from

mainstream broadcasters.

Kampe: Of course, everybody

talks about 4K these days, which

is being pushed by the industry in

the same way as 3D a couple of

years ago. But, in our view, 4K is

different and we expect that there

will be a real breakthrough soon.

That’s because 4K really brings

some added value into the living

room. In our opinion, the main

obstacle currently is the lack of

standardisation – especially for

the interfaces and connectors.

Right now there are too many

different concepts on the market.

It is much to be hoped that all

relevant industry partners will sit

together to negotiate over a widely

accepted standard.

Moore: No real demand for 4K as

yet, other than some small islands

in graphics and post, although the

newest crop of 4K capable cameras

is fuelling some demand.

Robinson: 2014 saw limited

enquiries about 4K, but we are seeing

some increase already in 2015.

Shrank: 4K DCI (4096x2160) is a

specialist arena, but the interest

in UHD (3840x2160) is high. Some

manufacturers’ early adoption

of 6G and 12G SDI link handling

provides a guideline for other

manufacturers to reach in advance

of any offi cial standards body

publishing guidance.

Vesely: We can see the

relevance of 4K currently only

for acquisition – fi lm or TV drama

production and subsequently in post

production. We don’t see other 4K

installations in our territory, apart

from Digital Cinema and preliminary

DVB-T2/S2 transmission tests.

Baumanis: Becoming more

knowledgeable in networking and

software solutions to be able to provide

the best possible services to our clients.

Burgess: Timescales are always

a challenge. Event deadlines

are usually fi xed and any delays

in the customer’s budget approval

process always squeezes the

SIs timescale.

Hughes: With technology

advancing rapidly we need to keep

up with these changes so that we

can provide our clients with the

technical expertise to evaluate the

options placed before them and

help determine the right technology

to fi t their needs.

Kampe: Besides our traditional

existing clients – where we are

very strong – we are constantly

developing new markets. Therefore,

one of the challenges we are facing

is the need for highly professional

colleagues in all departments and in

all our international subsidiaries. Some

of these new markets need different

solutions, tailored to their climatic

conditions, workfl ows, educations or

budgets. We face two tendencies

within our business - standardisation,

wherever possible, and customisation,

wherever needed. In both areas

we follow the company’s goal,

that is to deliver turnkey solutions

that fi t perfectly to the needs of our

customers – worldwide.

Moore: We are seeing increased

competition from international

organisations, with pressure on

margins and labour rates. We also

see that many manufacturers are

reducing their in-house expertise,

and it is being left to Systems

Integrators to fi gure out the details

on the technology. There has been

a considerable brain-drain in the

manufacturing end of the business,

and it’s getting more diffi cult to

fi nd product managers with

detailed knowledge of their range

in many organisations.

Robinson: An SI’s role is to give

a balanced innovative design

service to its customers. This has

never changed, and the roles

and knowledge to attain this is the

challenge. The industry still has an

appetite to do things correctly and

that’s where a good SI can make

a difference. If you are building a

house you make a decision on a

commercial basis on whether you

use an architect, surveyor, structural

engineer or design yourself. They

all have pros and cons. Our industry

is similar. If customers have the

correct knowledge base and

resources then they will adopt the

build to their own principle. If they

are looking for something different,

then that is where we come in. We

can offer design services through to

full turnkey solutions and everything

in between.

Shrank: The challenge will be to

keep pace with technology and

standards to ensure we maintain

the same high level of knowledge

across product ranges to give our

clients the best advice at all stages

of their requirements.

Vesely: Our continuous

challenge, with the vast number of

technology possibilities and merging

of commercial and professional

technologies, is to choose the right

solution for the right purpose and

not to follow only the price tag

when you make your choice.


Forum

Have you seen signifi cant interest in 4K installations?

Apart from budgets, what challenges are you facing in 2015?


Before the turn of the year, SNL Kagan

projected the worldwide over-the-top

(OTT) subscription video-on-demand

(SVoD) market should reach 124.6 million paid

subscribers and $8.4 billion in revenue by the

end of 2014. From there it should grow to 249.3

million subscribers and $18.7 billion in revenue in

2018. According to our estimates, North America

leads the market with 59.8 per cent of total

worldwide subscribers in 2014, with the region’s

share projected to drop to 37.7 per cent in 2018

as other regions grow faster but continue to lag

behind North America’s number of subscribers.

Future OTT SVoD growth is expected from

current market leaders such as Netflix Inc and

Time Warner Inc’s HBO as they go expanding

into new markets, plus new market entrants

such as CBS Corp’s CBS and Showtime, and

Starz. We believe that many content owners

could follow HBO’s lead and deliver their own

OTT SVoD services. This is part of the land grab

for pay-TV cord-cutters and ‘cord-nevers’. HBO

has first-mover advantage here with experience

in Scandinavia (Norway, Sweden, Finland and

Denmark), but others are joining the ranks.

Networks are evaluating OTT opportunities

cautiously as they do not want to alienate their

pay-TV operator partners. Still unknown is the

impact these standalone OTT services will have

on the pay-TV multichannel bundle. Some

pay-TV operators are already trying to add Netflix

content to their pay-TV bundles.

North America North America is the largest OTT SVoD market

today in terms of subscribers and revenue and

should remain so throughout the forecast period.

However, as mentioned, we project North

America’s share of the total market to decline

as other regions grow faster. Two major players

in North America (Netflix and Amazon.com Inc)

announced price increases earlier this year.

Amazon increased its Prime subscription price

from $79 to $99 per year, but that includes other

benefits beside the online video subscription

service (ie, free shipping and e-books). Netflix

announced a price increase from $7.99 to $8.99

per month, but delayed the increase to current

subscribers for two years.

Western EuropeAccording to our estimates, Western Europe

is the second-largest (after North America)

region today for online video subscribers and

revenues. Netflix, already in the United Kingdom,

the Nordics and the Netherlands, launched in

several European countries in 2014, including

France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium

and Luxembourg. Netflix is expected to launch in

additional Western European countries in 2015.

Netflix competitors are also expanding into more

countries, driving growth across Western Europe.

Wuaki, a strong OTT provider in Spain and the

Worldwide OTT subscriptions on the rise

Data Centre

2014 124.6 million

2015 154.7 million

2016 184.5 million

2017 216.9 million

2018 249.3million

Worldwide OTT SVoD paid subscriber forecast Source: SNL Kagan

Research from SNL Kagan points to strong worldwide growth for OTT subscription video-on-demand services by the end of 2018. Norm Bogen, research director at SNL Kagan, offers a detailed insight into the company’s latest report


Data Centre

UK, recently launched in France

and plans further expansion in Italy

and Germany in 2015. A plethora

of other OTT SVoD providers, led by

major media backers, are vying for

a share of the market. Commercial

TV network ProSieben’s Maxdome

is a significant OTT SVoD provider

in Germany, while other OTT SVoD

players are more commonly owned

by existing pay-TV operators —

notably Sky plc’s Now TV in the UK;

Modern Times Group MTG AB’s

Viaplay in the Nordics; Vivendi SA’s

CanalPlay Infinity in France; and

Prisa’s Canal+ Yomvi in Spain.

Eastern EuropeEastern Europe today constitutes a

relatively small share of the global

OTT SVoD market, with shares of

subscribers and revenue at 1.3 per

cent and 1.1 per cent of worldwide

volume respectively, according to

our estimates. Russia and Poland

are the two leading markets in

terms of number of OTT initiatives.

Most of the initiatives are backed

by TV networks with established

positions (ie, Cyfrowy Polsat SA’s

Polsat, Central European Media

Enterprises Ltd, HBO, TVN S.A.,

Viasat). SNL Kagan expects the

market to see significant near-

to medium-term growth given

the various OTT initiatives being

implemented by online video

providers. Ipla (Poland), Voyo

(Czech Republic and Romania)

and Viaplay (Russia) are some

of the early market entrants. The

region is expected to experience

dynamic growth in subscribers over

the next five years, at a compound

annual growth rate of 45.9 per cent

through 2018.

Asia-PacificAsia-Pacific, the world’s most

populous region, also has the

most TV households. We project

subscriptions to the region’s OTT

subscription video services to grow

at a compound annual growth

rate of 44.4 per cent through 2018

to 91.8 million subscribers. Youku

Todou is a major OTT player in

China, as is Hulu in Japan and Zee

Entertainment Enterprises Ltd’s Ditto

TV in India. Due to price sensitivity,

ad-supported OTT video is much

more popular than OTT subscription

services in China, India and other

less developed countries. However,

as the middle class in these

countries grows, SNL Kagan expects

Asia-Pacific to become the world’s

second-largest region for OTT SVoD

services by 2018.

Latin AmericaOTT SVoD services entered Latin

America earlier than some of

the other regions, with Netflix

and TotalMovie ranking as the

major providers. However, late in

2013, TotalMovie exited the Latin

American market to focus on selling

its online video platform to other

companies. That severely restricted

the growth of OTT SVoD services

in the region in 2014. However,

other players including América

Móvil’s Claro Video, Telefónica SA’s

On Video and VIVO’s Vivo Play

have stepped in to pick up the

slack. Credit card penetration in

Latin America is very low, creating

challenges in online payments for

OTT video services.

Middle East and AfricaThe Middle East and Africa

region represents a fraction of

the global SVoD market, with

estimated shares of subscribers

and revenue both at just 0.1 per

cent of worldwide volume. A lack

of premium OTT content, limited

consumer purchasing power and

insufficient broadband access

in many parts of the region keep

OTT services out of reach for

most households, particularly in

Sub-Saharan Africa. As a result,

several of the region’s main OTT

start-ups, including Nigeria-based

iROKOtv and United Arab

Emirates-based ICflix, have seen

most of their paid subscribers

using the services from outside

the region, as local households

either do not have the broadband

facility needed to stream

premium content, or cannot afford

a monthly subscription due to

low income.

2014 $8.4 billion

2018 $18.7 billion

Worldwide OTT SVoD revenue forecast Source: SNL Kagan

‘Asia-Pacific, the world’s most populous region, also has the most TV households. We project subscriptions to the region’s OTT

subscription video services to grow at a compound annual growth rate of 44.4 per cent through 2018 to 91.8 million subscribers’


Mobile and tablet viewing leads the way

Data Centre

Mobile and tablet viewing is expected

to reach 50 per cent of all online views

by late 2015, according to Ooyala’s Q3

2014 Global Video Index Report. The report also

shows that mobile and tablet devices reached

30 per cent of all online video views during the

quarter, representing a 114 per cent year-over-

year increase.

Viewers increasingly are turning to the internet

for their daily content, driven in large part by

increased access to premium and live video

content, especially international sporting events

and news of all sorts. The result is unprecedented

growth rates in mobile and tablet video

consumption. Broadcasters and publishers who

have access to this kind of consumption data

for their own content have a unique opportunity

to capitalise on this trend, particularly in mature

markets where video-capable devices and

wireless broadband are ubiquitous.

Ooyala’s Q3 2014 Global Video Index Report

also shows substantial growth of long-form video

consumption across devices. Connected TVs –

whether connected directly to the internet or via

game consoles and other devices – were central

to long-form content consumption during the

quarter. Viewers watched long form content,

videos longer than ten minutes, four times more

than on tablets and almost ten times more than

on mobile phones.

More surprisingly, the report shows that all

screens are becoming popular for watching

longer video. Tablet viewers spent 68 per cent

of their time watching video exceeding ten

minutes, indicating that tablets are becoming

nearly interchangeable with TVs for long form

video. Even mobile phone users spent 48 per

cent of their total viewing time with long-form

content, which tends to be premium content

such as TV shows, movies, news and sporting

events. This trend points to new monetisation

opportunities for premium video publishers as

mobile devices are no longer solely for ‘snack-

sized’ content.

“Cloud-based TV has arrived. Broadcasters

and content providers realise that, with the right

approach, IP-delivered content can be more

economical with higher return in terms of building

and monetising audiences, compared to linear

TV,” said Ooyala CEO Jay Fulcher. “What’s

really exciting is the pace at which many of the

most prominent players in the industry are now

innovating and meeting their audiences where

they are; with the content they want most,

on the right screen, at the right time, with an

incredibly rich experience.”

Other new statistics show consistent

patterns emerging in the way people shift their

video consumption across various devices

throughout the day, and also in how weekdays

differ from weekends when it comes to

device preferences.

Mobile devices in particular see steady views

throughout the course of a day. Globally,

smartphone and tablet views ramp up in the

morning and during commute hours; they dip

as the work day begins and people turn to their

PCs, rising again during the commute home and

peaking at night. Generally, this is a universal

pattern, except in Latin America where video

gets very little play on phones and tablets during

the day. Tablets remain the clear screen of

choice for web-delivered video in the evening

in every region, although on weekends when

they tend to be used only slightly more than

computers and mobile phones. The report also

shows nuances in daily device patterns that vary

across continents.

Ooyala’s Q3 2014 Global Video Index highlights monetisation opportunities for broadcasters across the globe, with share of mobile and tablet viewing having increased 400 per cent in two years

Viewing content Year-over-year, smartphone and tablet

views more than doubled, showing a

114 per cent increase

Smartphone and tablet video views

made up just six per cent of all online

video views in Q3 2012. In eight subsequent

quarters, growth has exceeded 400 per cent

Tablet viewers spent 23 per cent of their

time watching videos between 30 minutes

and 60 minutes long, the most of any device

Connected-TV viewers spent 80 per cent

of their time watching video longer than

ten minutes

TVBEurope March 2015 Digital Edition

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