Coveer2018-September.indd 1 www.csimagazine.com Is Android TVset for global domination? June 2016 • OTT, VoD, Cloud TV, Cable, Satellite, IPTV, DTT, IoT • TV Br oadcast •Streaming •SatelliteCab The leading mediafor videodeliverytechnology The magazinefor global video le •Hybrid The latest news, views andfeatures September 2018 16/08/2018 14:19:13

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June 2016 • OTT, VoD, Cloud TV, Cable, Satellite, IPTV, DTT, IoT • The latest news, views and features

Coveer2018-September.indd 1 16/08/2018 14:19:13 Pallavi Pandey 05 News & analysis 27 In-vehicle entertainment The next frontier for the broadcast industry Design and production Matt Mills (Manager) 08 Data corner: SVOD and video Jessica Harrington streaming 33 Compression special Special supplement deep diving into coding Viewing by device type in key global markets Regular contributors technologies and trends Adrian Pennington, Philip Hunter,

David Adams, Stephen Cousins, 10 COVER STORY: Android TV 41 Analyst corner Anna Tobin From Europe to Asia and beyond, is there Analysing SVOD trends and service closures any stopping ATV’s momentum in payTV? Circulation Joel Whitefoot 14 Open platforms and ATV 42 Nanosats Small satellites are suddenly big business Accounts Operators must look to open platforms to Marilou Tait, Lynta Kamaray future-proof their business 48 CSI Awards Editorial 15 Android TV - a case study This year’s shortlist in full tel +44(0)20 7562 2401 United Cloud gives an operator’s experience [email protected] of the deployment challenges and benefits 50 IBC 2018 preview Some of the things to look out for this year Advertising tel +44(0)20 7562 2435 16 Blockchain in broadcast [email protected] 51 Q&A with Michael Crimp Identifying the most promising applications tel +44(0)20 7562 2438 IBC CEO shares his highlights and thoughts [email protected]

Subscriptions tel +44 (0) 20 1635 588 861 Editor’s report: [email protected] Circulation manager: joel.whitefoot@ Android TV has emerged as one of the platforms to seriously benefit from the TV perspectivepublishing.com industry’s desire for speed, flexibility and ease of OTT app integration. Last year’s IBC will be remembered as one where Android TV really made its mark in terms Subscription rates of booth demos (with Google itself prominently positioned in Hall 14) and it can Per year: Europe £88; UK £68; Rest of World £98. Cheques payable to be expected that the numbers will swell at IBC 2018. Android TV is helping all Perspective Publishing kinds of software and hardware companies win business, not least set-top manufacturers ship- Limited and addressed to the ping millions of units and payTV deployments rocketing since Google’s Operator Tier certifi- Circulation Department cation programme was introduced in 2016. Another area that is seeing big traction right now is small low earth orbit satellites, a sector increasingly crowded by new entrants despite some Printed by Buxton Press question marks still persisting around technology and return on investment. Goran Nastic Managing Director John Woods

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Contents-Sep.indd 1 28/08/2018 16:07:06

News

BBC uses archive-scanning AI to news in brief co-create experimental TV programme VVC licensing body to be unveiled at IBC An experimental programme what BBC Four audiences audiences,” said Cassian The Versatile Video part-made by AI will broadcast might like, based on the Harrison, Channel Editor, Coding (VVC) in September as part of the channel’s previous schedules BBC Four. specification will be frozen BBC’s work on exploring how and programme attributes, The same archive- next year and expected to artificial intelligence might and then ranked programmes scanning AI has been used become an international open up new creative it thought were most relevant. to co-create ‘Made by standard in 2020. This will opportunities, as well as using “The BBC has one of the machine: When AI met the only work if commercial AI to resurface old shows largest broadcast archives in archive’ – a new and licensing terms can be based on previous schedules the world, and manually experimental programme agreed upon before the and programme attributes. searching millions of hours of exploring how BBC R&D’s codec is finalised. The BBC has developed programmes would be technology works. Presented Licensing is such a hot archive scanning AI software impossible. As it becomes by Dr Hannah Fry and a topic that the industry has that is uses to help discover a increasingly digitised, BBC virtual co-presenter, it agreed to create an selection of ‘hidden gems’ R&D is developing AI to help features four segments of extending entity, the Media from its vast archive. Using programme makers and archive clips sourced and Codec Industry Forum this AI technology from BBC schedulers unlock this edited together by the AI. (MC-IF), to deal with R&D, BBC Four scanned valuable resource. Relevant It marks a new era of profiling outside of programme information clips can be used to enrich creative AI in the TV MPEG. This new dating back to 1953 from News and Factual industry, somehting that is organisation will be over 250,000 TV programmes, for example, aready being put to the test announced at IBC 2018. programmes. According to while whole episodes or in others like music and Much more on VVC and the broadcaster, the AI learnt series can be re-released for even cooking. codecs on page 33.

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 05

News-05.indd 1 23/08/2018 09:12:55 News

news in brief

Casbaa becomes AVIA as Netflix joins ranks Asia’s Casbaa industry organisation has rebranded to the Asia Video Industry Association (AVIA). Netflix has also joined the newly renamed group, which is also encouraging other VoD providers and telcos to become members. In the biggest change in its history, the industry body is overhauling its image to stay relevant in the broader

video industry amid a of DAZN Image courtesy changing landscape. The rise of sports streaming services Verizon 5G video plans Verizon plans to launch its bring new challenges and opportunities residential 5G broadband service later this year to a The emergence of Amazon, Viewers were be able to watch These social media and handful of markets Facebook, Twitter, on top of the contest as part of a seven- targeted companies have bundled with Apple TV more specialist sports day trial on its online increased their focus on and You Tube TV. streaming platforms like platform, via iOS and signing live-streaming sports Customers who sign up to Eleven Sports Network, Android apps, and via its deals as young audiences Verizon’s 5G home DAZN and others is resulting Facebook page. increasingly rely on the internet service can choose in some big changes to the In Italy, Serie A’s domestic internet and connected to receive a free way sports rights are coverage will have a new devices to watch sports subscription to either acquired, packaged and home for the 2018/19 season, “The sport industry is ripe YouTube TV or an Apple consumed. after Mediaset struck a deal for disruption. Consumer TV 4K device. Other US These streaming disruptors with streaming service behaviour has been telcos are also expected to have been busy picking up DAZN, an offshoot of transformed by technology, use 5G fixed wireless rights in certain territories, Perform Group in the UK, to with streaming becoming the access as a means of which in the UK has seen show 114 top-flight games new norm for viewing winning over video subs major blows to more over the next three years. content,” said James from cable MSOs. traditional broadcasters Sports rights company Rushton, CEO of DAZN. including BT and Sky. IMG launched its first This disruption caused by Dish CTO joins Liberty Amazon has started consumer streaming service, new entrants certainly brings LatAm streaming the US Open Strive, offering top tier Italian many benefits to consumers Vivek Khemka is joining tennis tournament having and Spanish football across in terms of choice and Liberty Latin America as won the UK rights from Sky. the Nordics August 17th. flexibility consumption and SVP and Chief Technology Eleven Sports (which also Users in Sweden, Norway pricing, but there is a and Product Officer. Vivek happens to be the number of and Denmark will have downside too in that users Khemka was formerly countries the service is access to all Italian Serie A will have to get used to Executive Vice President currently available in though and Spanish La Liga football greater fragmentation to and Chief Technology this will grow very soon) matches with no minimum enjoy the sports they love. Officer for DISH Network launched a platform in the tie-in period for customers. Whether some kind of and starts in his new role UK for the first time this FuboTV, meanwhile, a OTT super aggregator at LLA in September, summer, starting with US-based sports streaming rises from the changes will reporting directly to CEO exclusive coverage of the US service, has bagged $55 be an interesting development Balan Nair. PGA Championship. million in funding. to follow.

06 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

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Untitled-1 1 22/08/2018 12:34:12 Data corner

adoption was wealthier consumers in their 20s and 30s. A skew to this TV renaissance? younger, wealthier segment is still SVoD is driving uptake of streaming OTT apparent. What’s happened since the early days of tablets entering the devices, which in turn are pushing users home is that other consumer segments have caught up with the early adopters back to the big screen. By Guy Bisson and, overall, the market has hit emember when level out. Winning out, it seems, is saturation at around 70% uptake. watching video what to some may seem the most Video viewing on the tablet is falling away from the TV unusual of devices for watching video partly because these other demographic set meant booting content: the television set itself. segments are a little less likely to use up your laptop or There are a number of factors mobile devices for viewing and partly huddling over a influencing this rush back to the big because other newer devices are PC? Tablets and screen, with the Smart TV being chief becoming more common in the home. Rsmartphones changed all that, among them. The TV replacement Those other newer devices (Smart TVs making TV on the go as easy cycle has seen Smart TV ownership and streaming boxes and sticks) push as pulling out your mobile jump to 53% of homes across Europe viewers back to the big screen. device (which like the TV, was and the US by the first quarter 2018. Streaming device and stick ownership ‘instant on’). Daily viewing on the Smart TV has now stands at 31% of homes across Tablet uptake has been closely followed suit. Europe and the US. Homes with associated with online video viewing But the story is a little more complex. these devices still have a very strong and second screen use. But as tablet Related to the Smart TV story is the skew for being younger and wealthier. ownership reaches saturation levels, underlying tablet story: the only Like early tablet ownership, consumers video viewing on the tablet is now consumer household type that still over- in their 20s and early 30s are most beginning to drop. While the indexes for tablet ownership is homes likely to buy streaming devices. smartphone has ascended rapidly with kids. Children drove a lot of the While OTT sticks can be used on the as an online video viewing device early adoption of tablets (and video go, they are generally used to view on (particularly among 18-24 year olds viewing on the device), as the tablet the main TV set. Ownership of where it is the most used device for became a classic baby-sitting device. streaming devices is still a way off daily viewing), it too is beginning to The other key segment for early majority, meaning strong skews to young wealthy consumers will persist. But certain segments are already beginning to catch up. OTT box and stick adoption among 45+ year olds has doubled in the past two years. And this older segment is far more likely to favour a big screen for viewing. A third factor in the TV set renaissance is content and content delivery itself. Markets with the highest uptake of Netflix and other SVoD services generally have the highest uptake of OTT streaming devices. The rapid growth of SVoD is, at least in part, responsible for the doubling of uptake of streaming OTT devices since the middle of 2015.

Viewing and device mix Different streaming device makers All charts sourced to Ampere Analysis Ampere to All charts sourced drive the market in different markets,

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% viewing on device daily By device Q3 2015 Q1 2016 Q3 2016 Q1 2017 Q3 2017 Q1 2018

Computer 15% 16% 21% 22% 21% 20%

Smart TV 19% 23% 26% 28% 18% 28%

Tablet 6% 6% 10% 14% 11% 12%

Smartphone 8% 10% 17% 20% 22% 21%

adding a further nuance to the evolving device/viewing/screen of 10 markets Based on analysis picture… that of the video platform associated with the device. In most European markets Chromecast holds the lead in terms of market share, followed by Apple TV. Both have their own video platform. The exceptions to this leading pair are interesting. In the UK and Germany, the Amazon Fire stick is the most used OTT device, and the second place in both markets is held by Sky’s Now TV box. In Italy (Sky’s other core market), Now TV boxes fall second to Chromecast. Poland is the only European market where the largest OTT market share is held by device makers which do not have their own video platform: Roku and Western Digital. Roku makes the top three in Europe only in the Netherlands and Spain. Yet in the USA, Roku leads as the most common streaming device with 31% market share, followed by Amazon Fire (29%) and Chromecast (19%). So the story of viewing and device mix is multi-faceted. There has been an explosion of device viewing options in the past decade, most of which hadn’t even been dreamed of a few years earlier. But convenience, video availability, life stage, age, SVoD uptake, streaming device manufacturer content alliances… even baby-sitting are influencing a migration for online video viewing back to a big-screen viewing

device first invented in the 1920s. / Shutterstock.com Robert Fruehauf Source:

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8-9_DataCorner.indd 3 28/08/2018 16:08:50 Android TV The magazine for global video

experience to mirror that on All for one and one for all their favourite mobile devices.

Howwww.csimagazine.com Google has both commoditised and Android attraction TV Broadcast • Streaming • Satellite • Cable • Hybrid The main factors driving the fragmentedThe leading mediathe for video television delivery technology middleware trend are content, capex, and September 2018 time-to-market. To attract market. Adrian Pennington reports subscribers, operators can either add all major OTT apps onto their set-top box using proprietary middleware (which can take a couple of years), or they can get it for free on

Amazon Channels open platforms such as Android TV. “This is an easy decision for many operators because they can’t afford to NRK Q&A do it with proprietary middleware - or the investment cannot be justified - especially as ARPU continues to decline,” says Frank Poppelsdorf, BT Sport Q&A Product Director, Irdeto. “In addition, they can hardly compete with the tech giant when it comes to the speed of services launching new features.” Cloud-based access access Cloud-based The particular requirement to make Netflix available on a device is driving smaller operators towards standardised platforms. “Having core applications hen Google “Android TV is the most successful in your market already available TV was standard middleware stack ever seen,” for Android on mobile is also a launched in declares Simon Leadlay, Director of Pay strong argument for the platform,” 2009/10, it TV Business Development at Accedo. confirms Frode Hernes, SVP Product Is Android TVwas set seen for by global“The platform domination? is changing the game Management at Vewd, the Norwegian operators as for Pay TV operators,” agrees Robert developer of the Vewd OS. “[Comcast’s June 2016 a challenge Guest, VP product management at rival] RDK never managed to OTT, VoD, Cloud TV, Cable, Satellite, IPTV, DTT, IoT The latest news, views and features Wto gain• control of the home. Access• Europe. “It provides them with establish a full solution for small Operators were reluctant to sign the flexibility to replace the default and mid-sized operators.” Coveer2018-September.inddup because 1 they didn’t retain full Google application launcher with14/08/2018 their 11:01:54 ATOT offers operators the ability to autonomy over their services and own custom or product-based UI and deploy the solution in as little as six the branding on the living room creates the opportunity to prioritise months and reduces integration costs screen. Google has since taken a their own content over that of third by requiring fewer developers to create more mature approach, parties in all aspects of the experience.” customised interfaces. The technology- relaunching Android TV in 2014 The standardisation of platforms, agnostic blend of broadcast TV with and the Android TV Operator Tier where operators can choose their own catch-up, VOD and now SVOD (or (ATOT) in 2016, aiming to give UX/UI layer, is long overdue. According other new OTT services) is a major power back to the operator’s to Guest, the disparity between the attraction for operators keen to serve services and environment, while STB user interface and that of OTT their customers the content they want. providing Google with a wider and mobile devices “has always “ATOT offers a highly compelling market penetration. Indeed, since challenged the ability of pay TV time-saving and cost-efficient then, millions of Android TV set- operators to offer a dynamic, multi- proposition for Tier 2 and Tier 3 box units were sold last year, while screen video experience.” operators and service providers, it is believed that Android TV In terms of front-end and UIs, enabling them to give a very attractive Operator edition qualified devices subscribers are increasingly expecting service to their subscribers, fast-tracking have reached 1million a month. the TV content selection and viewing their efforts to grab market share,”

10 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

10-12_Middleware.indd 2 20/08/2018 15:43:28 Android TV

further notes Pierre Donath, Director operators are showing willingness to charts around 70% of operators Product & Marketing, 3SS. sacrifice an element of control for the “looking seriously” at Android TV as an That’s not to say that Android isn’t low-cost option of Android TV, rather option but believe it will take any without its challenges: one of the most than the heavily engineered bespoke operator around 10 or 11 years to notable deterrents for operators is that systems that once characterised the replace their entire set top population. they are unable to prevent competitors’ IPTV era. Provided there’s a continued open apps or content from being Europe is a hotbed, where adopters approach from Google, Rethink downloaded, which can be a deal include Telecom Italia, Austria’s A1, forecasts 99.2 million Android TV breaker, and users must meet Google’s devices will ship through pay TV licensing requirements, which are operators by 2022. subject to change over time. “More and more “Many middleware providers and app Google Play Store, for example, must agencies are trying to move their be included and prominently operators are products to Android TV and create positioned. This is considered a big plus solutions for operators wishing to for many operators since it provides showing willingness deploy Android TV,” says Hernes. “This subscribers with access to over 3,000 space will become highly competitive. services and games, while remaining in to sacrifice an Only a few of these will survive.” the operator’s branded environment. Kaltura thinks middleware will retain While concerns about Google’s intent element of control importance by tying together OTT and to hoover up user data or analyse broadcast functions at the set-top box. viewing habits have been alleviated, for the low-cost “Middleware can handle the minimum concerns persist about ownership of the local business logic required that the whole UI. In particular, Google’s option of Android cloud cannot,” says SVP Gideon insistence on hooking the UI to Google Gilboa. “What we’re seeing is a new Assistant, the company’s voice TV, rather than the layer of this middleware type recognition and control technology functionality being developed by found in devices like Google Home, and heavily engineered vendors around the Android TV which can be activated via the remote’s bespoke systems ecosystem. In short, middleware built-in microphone. will be more narrowly defined but will “Google will allow its UI to be that once still exist.” removed and to have it focused around the operator’s content, but it requires characterised IPTV.” Middleware role change access to Play Store and Google A lot of this will be driven by the speed Assistant which is the point at which at which compelling IP-only services some operator’s resist,” says Leadlay. Estonia’s Telia and DNA Oy Finland become available and how operators’ One area highlighted by analyst firm (see table). Today, France dominates business models evolve. Android TV Rethink TV is whether or not Google Android TV in Europe with 3.3 million still provides middleware vendors with will be hostile to using Amazon’s Alexa homes installed from among 26 million the opportunity to add value through voice assistant, used in conjunction households, according to figures from the integration of tuners, IP multicast with Android TV. Rethink Research. SFR was the latest to support, smart home functionality and Nonetheless, more and more launch in the country this summer, support for ‘lightweight’ hardware such while Switzerland right as HDMI sticks. now remains the only “Standards such as HbbTV are also other market in Europe not included in Android TV, so there with a major tier 1 are opportunities for browser vendors operator, Swisscom with Android compatible browsers to (ex-Mediaroom and include companion screen and media supporting Android TV synchronisation functionality,” reckons (AOSP) for the past Guest. “This will also allow operators four years. and app developers to deploy apps in a However, new standardised way to TVs and STBs announcements are powered by Android and other OS’.”

Source: Rethink Research Source: picking up fast. Rethink Android TV can also be built into

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how to comply with all application,” explains Jacques Google’s style Bourgninaud, the company’s CEO. guidelines for the “The Wyplay ATOT application also remote control, such as includes a device abstraction layer that the keys on the handset provides complete independence from to output, and for the the Android TV device allowing user interface,” outlines operators to easily move to a new Stefan Blickensdörfer, hardware provider or platform.” Technical Director Meanwhile, Nagra says it will at 3SS. “There is intensify marketing around its ability to integration with the integrate Android TV with its existing player to manage Open TV back end (for operators like and you need to ensure Euskaltel in Spain). Source: RustyR / Shutterstock.com RustyR Source: complete TV middleware itself is likely to have hybrid DTH, DTT and IPTV boxes, as interoperability with all back-office less and less impact as the focus moves well as into pure OTT boxes and also functions. UI performance and to user experience and content, believes into hybrid cable set tops, so that it optimisation are critical whether Poppelsdorf. “There’s no doubt that the can emerge around any of the main using IPTV/OTT/DVB. And it all evolution in pay TV is threatening the pay TV technologies. has to reliably function with DRM/ role of proprietary middleware.” “In order for hybrids to be built, for conditional access.” He thinks the sector is likely to follow instance with DVB technologies, some the path of DRM fragmentation, at the form of middleware has to be added to Entrants new and old beginning of which many options control the broadcast environment, Companies like 3SS, Amino and competed for market share. “Open which is where set top makers like Technicolor now brandish Android TV platform middleware is fragmenting Amino and Sagemcom see their technology as their strongest suit. today and we expect more innovations opportunity, adding these services Technicolor alone has shipped 2 million to emerge in the next three to five through Android TV, and supporting Android TV units last year. Since the years, before we see the market the UI directly as well as supporting the beginning of 2018, the French company converge again.” existing back end of broadcast has facilitated five new STB launches, MediaFirst (née Mediaroom), which installations,” says Rethink’s lead plus nine noteworthy software updates stagnated at Ericsson, may now get a analyst Peter White. with Netflix or Amazon Prime on new lease of life under Ericsson’s new Fragmentation is predicted as the Android TV. brand MediaKind. The “virtual reach of Android TV grows. “In fact, Among them is Com Hem, which collapse” of the existing Cisco the market is waiting for more joined the club with launch of its new ecosystem has also largely given way to middleware to emerge,” thinks Donath TV Hub box, based on ATOT and pre- Android TV, judges Rethink Research. at 3SS. “There are very few middleware installed with YouTube, Netflix, SVT “There are a lot of small actors that right now that are fully ready for Play and TV4 Play. 3SS’ 3READY front have been running on good margins in Android STB deployments. But they end Android TV Custom Launcher small deployments, which will see their are coming.” integrates with Technicolor’s margins deteriorate as their software is More competition will put downward middleware, which brings together the commoditised,” says Vewd’s Hernes. pressure on prices while the range of chipset and the Android TV platform. “Some will manage to move up in the ‘quality’ and functionality will increase, French outfit Wyplay continues to value chain or become a de-facto choice offering service providers greater market its Frog middleware but has on one of the major platforms, but choice. This is because the role of also headed toward Android territory. many will struggle.” middleware in an Android platform is It has released an ATOT Launcher Not everybody is in Google owner different to traditional deployments. for operators to develop custom Alphabet’s pocket however. Comcast The ATOT platform does a lot of the applications with Wyplay offering has invested too much in RDK – which middleware’s ‘old’ job itself but there assistance with the design it would consider in allowing operators are many aspects of Android-based and integration. to pick and choose hardware at will – integrations that the operator has to “Our premium reference UI/UX can and its community is considered too big understand and manage. be customised to fit the operator’s in the US at least to be pushed around “From how to correctly integrate the brand. Alternatively, we can incorporate by Google. Play Store and Google Assistant, to their own UI/UX into our Operator Tier AT&T and Charter are holding out

12 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

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too, though rumours persist that they Some European and Asian Android TV operator deployments make break ranks for future OTT boxes. Operator Country Liberty Global (an RDK proponent) and other Tier 1 operators (Deutsche SFR France Telekom, Orange) are aloof from Bouygues France Google in Europe - for now. As a result, Free France while at least 40 payTV operators globally have deployed Android set-top Wibox France boxes as of September 2017, according Swisscom Switzerland to Dataxis, the number of users Com Hem Sweden remains limited. “Recently we’ve noticed some larger Telecom Italia Italy operators pushing back against the A1 Austria Google ecosystem – and firmly down Telia Estonia on the side of traditional middle stacks,” reports Accedo’s Leadlay. DNA Oy Finland “Western European operators who Stofa Denmark would otherwise seem to fit into the Euskaltel Spain mould for Android - having high ARPU and looking to grow OTT - have had a Telecable Spain chance to look at Android in some Wind-Hellas Greece detail and concluded it’s not for them.” “Mostly this is because they would Partner Communications Israel rather control 100 percent of the Rostelecom Russia platform and they’re not willing to let PCCW Hong Kong their users have third party apps on a box outside of their control.” KDDI Japan Foxtel Australia On the cusp of global success? Telkom Indonesia Indonesia For this reason, Android TV is unlikely to make a complete sweep of the market. Could this change too? provider, and so they will continue “There is some space for traditional “The re-emergence to favour AOSP or RDK.” middleware - though much diminished,” TiVo’s take is that Android TV “will says Leadley, who also reports some of NDS under continue to be a platform of choice revitalised interest in Roku (used for for a sub-set of operators looking to Sky’s Now TV streaming service). former chief Abe address specific business and market “Recently Roku has allowed for almost needs: others will opt for Linux, bring- full UI customisation (with which Peled is greeted your-own-device or other platform Accedo upgraded the UI for Telstra) categories that better serve their which has increased its attraction, with ‘a remarkable portfolio. Ultimately, having greater though given the hardware options are choice and flexibility in the ecosystem limited to one vendor, this will remain a optimism’ in is good for consumers and the market, niche product.” the industry.” in general.” The re-emergence of NDS under As it stands, the momentum for former chief Abe Peled is greeted with Android TV - driven by content, apps “a remarkable optimism” in the services to pay-TV subscribers strongly and by the shortened time-to-market - industry, according to Leadlay, but he’s outweigh any perceived commercial appears unstoppable. sceptical of the chance of it doing risks,” concludes Donath. “Many big “There is no viable competing business with anybody other than multiple system operators will likely platform,” says Hernes. “Unless Cisco’s traditional customer base. continue to want to remain someone manages to establish one “For many operators, the benefits of independent, and not over-reliant or Google change the rules, Android delivering Google’s highly popular on a single content or technology seems destined to succeed.”

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 13

10-12_Middleware.indd 5 30/08/2018 15:43:36 Promotional feature

these threats include Future proofing your pay TV loss of revenue, loss of STB investment, brand damage, piracy and business with open platforms the platform or data By Frank Poppelsdorf being compromised. pureplay OTT companies. Google has While Google has taken some steps he rapid global made the first move to collaborate with toward securing Android TV, operators growth of OTT operators by offering its version of the must take additional steps to protect services shows no open platform for set-top boxes. their service, platform and data. sign of abating and These include: defining specific this has fuelled an The rapid rise of Android TV security requirements for STB vendors evolution in the pay Take Android TV as an example – the to meet on Android TV, adding best-in- TV industry, where money operators will save in using this class content protection technologies, Toperators are having to adapt platform and the substantially shorter monitoring threats continuously, quickly to stay competitive. time to market for services mean the and having effective threat Consumer demand for OTT benefits of getting into partnerships response capabilities. services has even led to major TV with Google greatly outweigh the Securing open platforms requires operators including them as part concerns. If worries exist around careful planning, but it is well worth it of their set-top box (STB) offering collaboration, operators must consider for the benefits that open platforms like to ensure they can retain that Google’s business model is focused Android TV offer operators both now subscribers and market share. on advertising revenue. As such, and in the future. With Android TV, This move makes sense as, while Google’s main interest is in making operators can let Google develop the the need to differentiate on content Android TV the biggest platform for investment-heavy features, and get them is more critical than ever, apps in order to drive ad revenue, not to for free, while they focus on content operators also realise the need to compete with operators’ pay media and potentially UX differentiation adapt alongside the behaviour of services. In addition, with Android TV, through the Operator Tier (ATOT). today’s consumers who are relying the operator stills owns the STB and it There’s no doubt that in the shorter on multiple sources of content to is possible to replace Android TV with term, Android TV is the best open fulfill their entertainment needs. Android Open Source Project (AOSP) platform option. New operators can use The realistic outlook is that in ten to or other middleware to break the tie Android TV to build a premium STB twenty years, all content will be with Google if required. comparable to one that took a large delivered through OTT, which means Another attraction of open platforms operator years to build. But it’s not just that this collaboration represents an is that they can provide a treasure-trove relevant for new operators. Even important step. As this wholesale move of data, as consumers are likely to use successful large operators could have to OTT takes place, the advantages many more services on them compared serious reasons to switch to Android operators have in broadcast services will to closed platforms. By analysing this TV. In a highly competitive landscape eventually evaporate, meaning they data, operators can gain audience and where operators face strong challenges must make a smooth and cost-effective business intelligence to help them to hold onto subscribers and market transition into hybrid quickly. Many are improve their offering to satisfy the share, they must look to open platforms turning to open platforms for a ready customers they are fighting so hard to future-proof their businesses. supply of OTT apps and other popular to keep. Irdeto will be exhibiting Irdeto Armor features to reduce the cost, time and for Android TV at IBC. Visit us at Hall 1 risk of going hybrid. Securing open platforms Stand D51. Alongside this, you have the The nature of open platforms does increasing move into media services by mean there are inherent security risks the big four technology companies – that must be addressed by operators.

Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google These include content piracy (such as Frank Poppelsdorft is VP, Product – which brings them into direct sight of misuse of the Kodi app), STBs reloaded Management, Irdeto operators’ customer base. Operators and repurposed with unauthorised must therefore learn to collaborate and software, and malicious apps side- Sponsored by: co-exist with the big technology loaded or from the app store attacking companies as they have done with the the STB. The potential consequences of

14 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

14_Irdeto.indd 1 03/08/2018 14:46:49 Android TV -case study

proactive in accepting inputs from United Cloud STB project: our side as we were giving them an operator’s perspective which induced significant changes in Android TV. An Android TV experience We eventually got the best of two worlds by selecting Google’s Watson By Mladen Mijatovic than 1,200 live ABR (adaptive bit-rate) launcher for Android Oreo with certain very operator out TV and Radio channels and more than modifications that made it more there knows that if 50,000 VOD assets, each in 5 different appealing for the operator environment. you want to stay streaming quality profiles. Over competitive, you have 130,000 hours, or almost 15 years Why Android TV? to keep pace with of content is being viewed daily on Recent consolidation of chipset technology, but the the UC platform. manufacturers has left the market with real question is which When we started development of a few chip vendors and many OEMs. Edirection you should run in? Go the Linux based set-top box (STB) the first Having a full ecosystem that works on wrong way and you might end up challenges brought first doubts. Our any OEM hardware, with new IP-only far behind the competitors once existing application for Android TV devices free of hybrid development and you realise you have made a wrong worked quite well already on retail ATV more hardware neutrality, brings turn. Not so long ago, this almost boxes and preloading an app seemed unprecedented ease of CPE happened to us. as easy as it gets. Somehow, the development. Android TV is a dream- United Cloud is the Technology whole Android TV thing just clicked come-true for most operators: a first- Research & Innovation Development into right place for us and we realised screen TV viewing device that is also Center of the United Group, a we should change direction. And app-based. A smart (Android TV) box company focused on the telco, so, we did. compared to a traditional STB is what a content and marketing business, But it wasn’t easy. Fast time-to-market smartphone is compared to a feature having operators with a network in reality applies only to pure OTT phone. The ATV STB is now available footprint in four countries of the Android TV devices. Add DVB and as an operator device that comes former Yugoslavia (Serbia, BiH, conditional access system (CAS) on top bundled with subscription, and not only Montenegro, Slovenia), a satellite DTH of it to make a hybrid box and the through retail. A synergy of STB with platform and a worldwide OTT reach whole thing starts to look more like a other connected devices that come with with a total of some 3.6 million RGUs. traditional STB development. WiFi and Bluetooth connectivity and a Today’s pay-TV ecosystem is Introduction of TV Input Framework myriad of 3rd party applications experiencing both network change did help, but still a big part of DVB available on Play Store pave the way for and device change, reflecting the integration depended on the original other future services such as IoT and change in delivery methods to equipment manufacturer (OEM). The many potential business models with accommodate new subscriber big dilemma was whether to develop a up-sell, cross-sell and 3rd party requirements - the “anytime, anywhere, custom operator launcher with new, partnership opportunities. on any device” concept is a de facto native app development, or to stick with To conclude – remember when each standard now. Traditional, linear TV Google’s launcher and lose some of the mobile phone had its own OS, while is already losing the battle with non- unique operator look and feel. today we have only iOS and Android? linear Catch-up and Time-shifted Google Assistant, a remarkable Well, we just might be on the verge of TV as viewers’ habits change and tool that unfortunately does not yet something similar in the TV industry. become more demanding. work everywhere brings microphones Android TV is picking up momentum United Cloud is tasked with driving and speech input that already works and interesting times lay ahead of us. the cutting edge of technology behind in surprisingly many languages, all this change and we have developed opening new, though unclear, a complete e2e video platform to possibilities. We turned to consultants deliver linear and non-linear video for help, but there were few available Mladen Mijatovic is Business services to the full range of consumer for Android TV and we were forced Development Manager at United Cloud devices. With the first service to learn along the way and ultimately launched in September 2017, under pave the road for others. A great deal Sponsored by: the brand-name ‘Eon’ we are now of help came from Google and the processing and delivering more Android TV team - they were very

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 15

15_Unitedcloud.indd 2 20/08/2018 10:04:21 Blockchain

VOD consumers, Blockchain in broadcast analogous to Napster peer-to-peer music file Blockchain can destroy the existing video value sharing, but this time on a legal, trackable basis. chain – and that’s a good thing, argues Nick Moreno The end prize is lockchain technology simpler rights licensing to be contracted significant – imagine a world where a is primarily automatically, and there is hope that in Pareto-like selection of the most viewed associated with time this process may be applicable to content is stored ultra-locally across the the Wild West of larger value deals. The selling and globe. Where the most popular videos cryptocurrencies, acquiring of content rights, therefore, can be served up to any viewer but distributed becomes a significantly simplified on-demand through being delivered databases that offer process, eliminating friction in the value from servers or PCs just a few streets Ba single, incorruptible “universal chain and potentially empowering the away – delivered as a download or even truth” and eliminate the functions spread of the OTT business globally. streamed ultra-locally. Where the vast of many intermediaries could Of course, a rights blockchain has amounts media companies currently potentially revolutionise the video hurdles to overcome – not necessarily spend on distribution could be value chain. in the technology stack, but rather in reduced significantly. For many people, Blockchain is the challenge of agreeing a taxonomy The video distribution value chain linked to the rise of Bitcoin, but it is for which multiple rights from multiple could be fundamentally redrawn by a nothing more (or less) than an enabling rightsholders can be logged in a way successful application of blockchain technology, and we need to evaluate its that doesn’t need thousands of different technology, and there is a strong potential in terms of its applications metadata categories and classifications. argument that this would be entirely and the value-add it may bring. Several large media companies are welcome if it improved the speed and exploring this use case now, putting quality of video delivery to viewers, and Uses cases together blockchain technology stacks reduced the cost of doing so at the Tracking advertising. Perhaps the and conducting trials. I would argue same time. use case most widely discussed is that that a point solution from a single But, of course, there are challenges. of advertising, with a distributed rightsholder is significantly less Blockchain technology would need to database bringing together both ad beneficial than the network effects of a be able to authorise, enable and track inventories and advertisers in a way that pan-industry rights ledger (with privacy/ legal provision of P2P video eliminates the significant number of restriction of view as mandated by distribution, as well as offer a payment intermediaries that take a slice of each individual rightsholders), enabling a process for the millions that might ad dollar spent by advertisers well single “version of the truth” rights allow their servers, PCs or laptops to be before ads are shown on linear channels ledger globally. used for such a service. And video files or AVOD models. In the interests of openness, Arqiva is are vastly larger than music files; Several companies (including, participating in one such European/ rightsholders would need to radically ironically, some of the advertising North American trial now. It is fair to rethink their strategies; and IP networks intermediaries themselves, who are say that there is huge interest in such an would have to be able to cope with (and clearly trying to “add more value” in the application from both global multi- allow) a vast increase in traffic. value chain) are working on this channels and national broadcasters, as application, and there are a fair number it offers the tantalising prospect of Growing interest in the ‘B-word’ of papers on this use case. increased rights revenues and reduced Our customers are showing interest in transaction costs for rightsholders, and Blockchain and sessions are gathering Rights licensing. Another potential a ‘one-stop shop’ and reduced momentum at industry events. Whether use case for the video industry is a transaction costs for rights licencees. it turns out to be hype or not, the distributed database (or ledger) of ‘B-word’ will rise up the priority list of global video rights that catalogues all Ultra-local distribution. An even technologies that broadcasters will content rights worldwide and allows more intriguing application is within explore over the next 12 months, and it defined interactions with that ledger to distribution. It is very early days, but will be a brave (or foolish?) CTO who license video as its original rights some are thinking about the technology dismisses it as not worth investigating. holders deem allowable. being used to power a new model of Nick Moreno is Director of Strategy, Smart contracts will initially allow ultra-local distribution of content to Satellite & Media, at Arqiva

16 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

42_Blockchain.indd 2 08/08/2018 15:36:28 Sponsored by: www.csimagazine.com

Security focus

The changing face of security - and piracy

17-21_Verimatrix.indd 1 15/08/2018 10:43:33 Security

While the World Cup is Broadcast security is about clearly an extreme example, these findings underline the scale of more than just content now international online content piracy. So what is From cybersecurity and IoT to IT security and the best way to combat it – and who should bear responsibility for disaster recovery, broadcast companies need to doing so? look at security holistically, says David Adams “Historically, pay TV operators and channel operators have arly film-makers had organisations, using set-top boxes, looked to the people who own the complete control to Conditional Access (CA) technology content to provide anti-piracy services – the access of their and mainstream payment systems. But they pay a lot of money for the content, content. universal access to high quality after all,” says Paul Hastings of Friend Movie studios, electronic equipment also enables much MTS. “But the people who own the broadcasters and the simpler piracy methods: with a good content are now the least capable of owners of premium screen and a good camera, anyone securing it, because they are furthest Econtent have tried to exercise similar could create their own instant illegal removed from the people doing the levels of control, with varying levels of streaming facility, redistributing content piracy. The people best placed to success. But while there have always using Facebook, YouTube, Periscope, protect premium content have a direct been ways to steal content, internet twitch.tv or other platforms and apps. relationship with the customer technology has given content pirates The most sophisticated piracy restreaming the content. Some content more powerful tools. operations, which Peterka believes are owners are writing into contracts a “Advances in technology that enable responsible for a majority of this stipulation that broadcasters or service the proliferation of legal content – activity, have been helped by the providers must be able to provide availability of devices that decode and availability of cheap hardware, cloud subscriber level watermarking for set- decrypt, good broadband network services and OTT technologies. top boxes and OTT.” capabilities – these same technologies The results are revealed by studies Peterka believes effective anti-piracy are also enabling the theft and illegal such as research compiled by Viaccess- technology is based on a combination redistribution of content,” says Petr Orca during the 2018 football World of technologies, including watermarking Peterka, CTO at Verimatrix. Cup, which analysed illegal streaming to enable detection and removal of the Some piracy is the work of links not stopped by tracking services sources of illegal streams; and analysis sophisticated, well-equipped used by rights owners or TV operators. of data drawn from the distribution An initial study of five first round chain, to which automation and matches showed that Facebook hosted machine learning can be applied to the most links to illegal streams, 1,792, detect a wide range of anomalies and well ahead of the domain in second security breaches. place, emb.aliez.me, which hosted 699 But he also stresses the need for (see table on next page). consistency in the way watermarking is A second study of more first round used for the same content – in the matches saw Periscope break into the international OTT world, why would a top five domain locations. Both studies broadcaster bother to use watermarking identified the same top five ISPs if viewers can access versions that are hosting the sites used for streaming: two not protected by watermarking? in the Netherlands (NForce and Quasi), The mix of legacy equipment in Private Layer in Switzerland, Marosnet broadcaster networks and consumer in Russia and Contabo in Germany. In homes also makes a blended approach total, across 17 first round matches, necessary. “CA, if you ask me, is dying Viaccess-Orca recorded over 1 million – new green field services don’t really views of illegal streams via Periscope, have that anymore,” says Dr Susanne 3.1 million via YouTube and 7.5 million Guth-Orlowski, vice-president, business via Facebook. development and sales, at castLabs.

18 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

17-21_Verimatrix.indd 2 15/08/2018 10:44:06 Security

based content protection may not be with us for a while yet, reckons James McParlane, chief science officer at Massive. He points out that any content stored on the blockchain could only be encrypted using traditional DRM methods. “So, blockchain for content “But it’s still used in existing broadcast attack originated in Russia. distribution is functionally just a peer- services, so broadcasters have to serve Pierre-Alexandre Bidard of Viaccess- to-peer CDN,” he says. all the old and new ways of Orca, emphasises the importance of But that may change. “Its future transmission.” securing the set-top box, not just to application in this industry will be in Frank Poppelsdorf, VP, product protect the content that passes through supporting and securing a decentralised management at Irdeto, says that a focus it, but also “because the STB can architecture upon which many on watermarking should not mean become a weapon”, if used to launch applications and content distribution neglect of other security methods. Dedicated Denial of Service (DDoS) systems will run,” he explains. But this “Operators ask if they still need to attacks on other organisations’ IT will not happen for a while yet. expend so much effort on secure networks, for example. Another countermeasure that may be chipsets,” he says. “Well, yes, you do: if Another area of concern is the extent used more extensively in future would there is a weakness there the pirates will to which companies now rely on cloud- require more collaboration between go for it.” based IT systems. Many cloud services broadcast industry players and internet Content security is also a concern for provide excellent security, but increased infrastructure providers, says Simon infrastructure and transit providers. use of the cloud can mean less control Trudelle at Nagra. Intelsat CISO Vinit Duggal says his “We’ve already been able to put in company has been speaking to place systematic URL-blocking broadcasters and its other customers “The STB can procedures, when we have proof that about security for many years. “You this is not a legitimate owner of have to look at security holistically. You become a weapon content,” he says. “I think a growing need to understand the security global awareness from [internet] requirements you have when the data is if used to launch companies that they are not just pipes at rest and when it is on the move.” and that they have to shut down access There are other security threats facing DDoS attacks on to these services would be helpful.” broadcasters and video service Nick Fitzgerald, CEO of TV2U, providers. Where once broadcast other organisations’ identifies possible changes in strategy networks and content storage were around identifying legitimate users of completely separated from a company’s IT networks.” content, noting that VPN use has made core IT infrastructure, both are now it difficult for OTT service providers to vulnerable to the same cyber security use IP addresses to determine whether threats that could affect any connected over systems and data. Over-reliance on a consumer has the right to watch a IT system. There is an argument that the cloud could increase business specific piece of content. “One way any strategic consideration of content continuity and security risks, says OTT providers tackled this issue during security should now be integrated Jonathan Morgan, CEO at Object the World Cup was to add an additional within a broader strategy, addressing Matrix. “If you wholly rely on a single layer of user verification via token-based the same risks that might enable the cloud service you would be just as device authentication,” he says. theft of other valuable information vulnerable as if you were wholly storing Combined with geo-location data, this assets, from customer data to everything internally,” he says. Again, gives a much granular visibility. intellectual property or confidential the value of a strategic overview is clear In the end, Daniel Simmons at IHS corporate information. Some In future, we will certainly see the Markit argues increased competition broadcasters or service providers are development of new security threats should make content better; and people targeted by hackers for political reasons, and new countermeasures to address should feel better about paying for it. as seems to have been the case when a them. There has been some discussion “Of course it’s still going to be desirable cyber attack hit French TV network of how the distributed ledger technology to pirate it, but the surest way to fight TV5Monde in 2015. The French blockchain could be used as a security piracy is to make paying for the video authorities later concluded that the tool by broadcasters. But blockchain- good value.”

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 19

17-21_Verimatrix.indd 3 15/08/2018 10:44:15 Focus feature

content. The fact that The changing face of piracy pirates can and must exploit the internet to redistribute content – and anti-piracy techniques can be seen as a two- edged sword. New By Petr Peterka, CTO, Verimatrix This was opportunities have emerged for configured to countering their activities that give he way pirated media provide the authorised decrypted service providers the potential to gain content is both control word to other receivers upon the upper hand. created and request, then used to decode an Inevitably piracy now reveals itself consumed has encrypted pay-TV service. This through various clues or indicators changed dramatically exploited the early but increasing including some outside the domain or since the advent of IP online connectivity to distribute control reach of traditional security systems. video distribution and words but did not expose pirates to This is where machine learning (ML) Tassociated OTT services. The same direct detection. comes in by providing the potential to infrastructure and tools that have However, with growing penetration of train monitoring systems to identify revolutionised video distribution managed pay-TV services requiring signatures of activity including illicit and enabled an explosion of access to the source to obtain decrypted content redistribution. content, as well as in the ways content, pirates were forced to abandon of viewing it, have also been control word sharing and instead get Three layers of security exploited by pirates for direct access to the service or content. As piracy increasingly involves illicit redistribution. So, they started distributing the repackaging channels and other stolen However, the fact that pirates have content itself rather than the smartcards content into what often appear to migrated to redistributing the content or control words enabling access to it. consumers like legitimate pay-TV itself rather than just control words In doing so pirates have been able to services, anti-piracy systems must offer enabling access to it, has itself provided exploit all the same infrastructure and new methods that bear down on the new hope of stemming the rapidly rising technology, including CDNs, broadband latest piracy techniques. Because this tide of illicit redistribution. access and adaptive bit rate streaming, landscape is constantly changing, On one hand, the onset of live and that has driven the boom in legitimate Verimatrix focuses its efforts in the linear OTT services has stimulated OTT services. three main layers of security. pirates with the prospect of tapping In fact, a survey conducted by Prevention. Authentication, managed revenues associated with premium Cartesian, “The Future of Broadcast entitlements, content encryption and content – live sports in particular. Yet Cardless Security Revisited,” shows that CA/DRM to prevent the leakage of at the same time there is fresh optimism the focus of concern in the industry has content to unauthorised users during that the visibility and traceability made moved further towards content transport and storage. possible through two-way IP networks redistribution and away from control Monitoring. Collect and analyse data can ensure that pirated streams are word sharing. not only from the CA/DRM system detectable in near real-time. Therefore, This trend towards piracy via content but also from the end-to-end actions like blocking can be taken redistribution has therefore extended distribution chain. within a few minutes before significant and elevated the challenge for providers Traceability. Ability to trace the source revenue has escaped or major business of revenue security services and of unauthorised users through forensic damage resulted. technology. Fortunately, the availability video watermarking solutions. In the 1990s and early 2000s, before of two-way connectivity has provided These layers work in concert to many consumers enjoyed access to the the means of detecting piracy in the provide a strong and comprehensive internet, smartcard sharing or cloning form of content redistribution as it security platform that best addresses was the predominant method of piracy. happens and responding to it in today’s piracy threats. The whole is Then as internet access became more near real-time. greater than the sum of the parts. prevalent control word sharing took It has also exposed pirates themselves Traditional methods of preventing over, where a legitimate card was to identification since they must have a access to pay-TV content ensure only typically attached to a personal presence on the internet to advertise, legitimate users get access to decrypted computer or unauthorised set-top box interact with their “subscribers,” content subject to usage rules such as connected to the internet. provide billing accounts and redistribute location, timing and device; making the

20 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

17-21_Verimatrix.indd 4 15/08/2018 10:45:04 Focus feature

first layer of prevention as important as ever. The second layer of monitoring is in fact the most recent addition to the revenue security armoury. Yet it is an essential requisite for traceability because unless a breach can be detected – or even predicted – in the first place no further investigation is possible. The roots of monitoring tools combined with network forensics go back to the emergence of two-way video services incorporating a return path two 3 Layers of Security decades ago. This made it possible to introduce interactivity and data Verimatrix has been adding this cross- CAPEX, through being deployed as a gathering for audience and service referencing capability based on ML software-as-a-service (SaaS) model, but analytics, but it also provided visibility to its VCAS Anti-Piracy Monitoring several other benefits as well. for the operator to follow content and Response services, which help It increases the scope for ML by through its journey to the end-device operators address the rising threat of bringing together the different sources and potentially beyond. illegal redistribution. of data held by a given service provider Until recently, security monitoring Traceability, the third layer, means in one region, but also data from other data was confined to CA and DRM being able to track individual content geographical areas of a single operator systems or associated transactional streams or instances back to their and even different operators. activities such as logging into a device source, which is an essential step Increasingly systems, such as VCAS or requesting a key for a given channel. towards being able to take actions such Anti-Piracy Monitoring, have a window But now a bigger picture can be as service take-down. This capability on the whole world, which means that obtained by incorporating data from has been introduced with forensic as soon as an attack on a given operator additional sources such as CDNs, VoD watermarking, which can label content is detected in one region, its signature servers or logs of network traffic, and indelibly with marks transparent to the can immediately be captured so that integrating all this into a single model viewer at different stages of the journey, defences can be primed elsewhere. for machine learning to work on. The including at the intended end device, Cloud monitoring combined with ML power of such data lies in scope for such that once detected a stream’s also enhances the innate immunity cross referencing between the various source can be identified. against threats that are unknown or sources that were previously maintained Forensic watermarking has existed for have not yet occurred by enabling and analysed as separate silos. around 15 years, but mandating of detection of signals of attacks in general In one instance, a device was found forensic watermarking as part of of clustering or other anomaly detection to be requesting multiple video streams, MovieLabs’ Enhanced Content whatever their nature or origin. but not the keys that should be required Protection recommendations was The other advantage of deploying to decrypt them. This would have perhaps the watershed moment for the security in the cloud is that software passed undetected without the cross- field in order to adequately protect the can be updated, and patches issued referencing ability, which would emerging UHD and 4K quality levels of quickly, automatically and globally so highlight the behaviour as suspicious. content. It set the tone for what is that vulnerabilities can be snuffed out The keys had been extracted separately, becoming an integral role of everywhere as soon as possible. via a different device, as part of that watermarking as a cornerstone of the A layered security system – deployed particular attack method. third security layer of traceability. as a SaaS – enables the identification As more and more data is monitored, and ability to investigate suspicious additional anomalies will come to light Cloud-based security behavior on the network, which would and extend the net capable of detecting The cross-referencing capability of otherwise be hard to monitor in a piracy early on so that the tracing monitoring dovetails nicely with traditional on-premises deployment. through application of forensic video another major trend in revenue security, And this helps staying one step ahead watermarking can be invoked in time to which is the migration to the cloud. It of the pirates. identify the source and take appropriate brings to the fore all the cloud Visit Verimatrix at IBC 2018 in Hall 5, action quickly. advantages, like scalability and reduced Stand A59

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 21

17-21_Verimatrix.indd 5 15/08/2018 10:45:14

Promotional feature

Putting in place their own content Taking back control of your delivery network – a TV CDN – TV service providers can overcome the onboarding challenge because the delivery network to create network is completely within their control. A purpose-built network can predict sessions as they begin and better OTT event TV start balancing the server load. Once the first two minutes and that can put a requests occur in earnest, a TV CDN By Johan Bolin big strain on any delivery network. allows them to reallocate functions, hether So, while these can be used as showcase spreading popular live assets across it’s being events for TV services, they also multiple servers, reducing pressure on used by highlight the challenges TV service single servers. traditional providers face when trying to deliver the The more popular the live content is, broadcasters most in-demand programming to the wider it is spread. This capability as a way millions of people at once. This can increases the number of servers that to deliver leave audiences experiencing events can stream the live content and stops Wsupplementary programming or a with delays and glitches – even some the overloading of the servers that modern TV service provider as the total outages – when programming is received the initial streaming request. primary means of reaching its distributed by internet-delivered means. TV CDNs are also more attuned to audiences, internet-delivered TV is managing content requests between the now mainstream. Employing a dedicated TV CDN delivery server and the content owner’s Huge-scale events like the World Cup Delivering content using rented origin. They consolidate multiple have become key milestones for content bandwidth on a content delivery requests which save capacity both on delivery. They’re an opportunity for TV network (CDN), is often the culprit for the origin server and backhaul network. service providers to give audiences this. And this is something completely This kind of control over viewing experiences that are only outside the control of the content programming is something that content available through internet-delivered TV. provider. So, if live OTT services are to owners just don’t have if using a third- This summer the BBC showcased become primary sources of better- party managed network. So, by incredible-looking 4K HDR content quality TV programming over deploying a dedicated delivery network, from both the World Cup in Russia and broadcast, content owners need an they’re able to more easily manage from the grass tennis courts of answer to the onboarding challenge. audiences as they onboard for major Wimbledon. It did this not by its By building a dedicated network for live events. This reduces delays, traditional broadcast means but OTT, the distribution of internet-delivered buffering and glitches. using its iPlayer service. TV, content providers can overcome Millions already rely on internet- Broadcast may eventually improve, what’s considered live OTT’s biggest delivered services, making the making it able to deliver better quality challenge. And the financial distribution of big live OTT events just content, but internet-delivery is already justifications for doing so isn’t as as important as traditional broadcasts. doing it. It’s able to create viewing high as many think. By employing a dedicated TV CDN, experiences that are far beyond Frost and Sullivan last year outlined operators are able to create and deliver broadcast. These are comprised of at what point operators can benefit the beyond broadcast experience only colour-rich HDR content, in advanced from building their own network. The available to online viewers. resolutions with higher frame rates on a analyst house said rolling out a private Edgeware will be exhibiting at IBC in service that can be tailored with CDN becomes both operationally and Hall 14.F20. personalised ads. cost-effectively beneficial if there are But that’s only the case if the right 100,000 subscribers located within a infrastructure is in place to deliver it. single geographical area. For many

These ‘big live’ OTT events, as national broadcasters this can easily Johan Bolin is VP, Products, Edgeware describes them, are when be the case. The number of audience Edgeware millions of people try to onboard onto a members that want to stream major streaming show at the same time. sporting events will quickly surpass Sponsored by: During these big events, an average of these criteria – therefore a private 50-60% of client requests occur within CDN should be considered.

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 23

23_Edgeware.indd 2 24/08/2018 14:51:41 Machine Learning

achine Learning (ML) has become The heart of the new a hot button in many industries and broadcasting role of TV data analytics is no exception, which means it Machine Learning can bring great Mhas generated expectations of benefits and costs savings that can value across the broadcast chain but run ahead of reality. it is important to be realistic and critical, At this point in time, ML and other techniques under the banner of AI says Philip Hunter (Artificial Intelligence) are just starting to deliver real gains in productivity and customer satisfaction in various parts of video lifecycle. At the same time, many of the more extravagant promises are some way from being realised and may be unrealistic even in the medium to longer term. The first task then for service providers trying to identify where ML can enhance their business is to reset the dial of expectations and identify those areas where it can make a difference now, as well as those where the gains are some way in the future. There are also some cases where ML has been promoted, but is irrelevant.

Supervised vs unsupervised ML It is worth gaining some grasp of the determine edges, while the second anomalies in a system. There is also a underlying technologies and variants, might assemble these edges into hybrid category, semi-supervised ML, with a distinction often made between possible objects while the third might designed to combine the advantages of ‘deep’ and ‘shallow’ ML. In essence, then isolate features such as noses, eyes both, but this can be complex to Machine Learning is a branch or subset and ears, so that the fourth can then implement because it involves joining of AI that applies various statistical recognise this is a face and the fifth data sets with different properties to techniques to feedback in order to identifies the individual. The roles of combine the two forms of learning. improve performance on specified the layers may not always be as clear “All these methods have a role to play tasks, such as making increasingly cut, but deep learning does harness going forward in broadcasting,” says accurate predictions or finding patterns computational power to improve Chris Ambrozic, VP of Product at TiVo. in data. It evolved from pattern performance on large complex data sets “Supervised learning takes many forms recognition and data mining to enable like images or voice input through such in machine learning because it is often ever more sophisticated feedback a layered approach. the most dependable. Anomaly capable of analysing large data sets and There is also a distinction between detection in data pipelines and churn as such has become a cornerstone of supervised and unsupervised ML, with prediction are examples where this big data analytics. each being more applicable for certain method shines. Then the most visible Deep learning represents a further tasks in the broadcast chain. Supervised application of unsupervised learning is advance where input data percolates ML involves labelled data sets and in clustering algorithms and through multiple layers involving guidance from humans during the collaborative filtering. Clustering feedback between each, enabling tasks learning process, while unsupervised methods are most common when to be broken down into manageable ML operates without human dividing audiences into interests for units. In facial recognition, the first intervention and can identify sponsoring content or finding the layer might take raw pixels as input and unexpected patterns in data or optimal set of skinny bundles to provide

24 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

24_26_Machinelearning.indd 2 22/08/2018 16:34:10 Machine Learning

to your audience. Collaborative filtering and unsupervised ML is also workflows,” Shen adds. “Our is used to introduce content to a viewer acknowledged by Vivek Koul, Director MediaMind Platform will enable the based on similarities to other viewers.” of Engineering at Interra Systems, a automated editing of programmes provider of QA and monitoring aimed at groups, or even eventually, at products. “Yes, both should play a role individual consumers. It will provide the “Directors will need in different areas. Supervised ML can capacity to cost-efficiently mass be used effectively for image produce customised content for an to continue to teach recognition, object detection or other audience of one.” content classification applications. This is admittedly very much in the an AI assistant Unsupervised ML is more applicable future but does highlight where for detecting rare video artefacts like investment in ML is currently being how to make better tape-based dropouts, where less data is made. Personalisation of content is available for training purposes.” becoming a big focus of research, cuts, by telling it Such drop outs can be associated according to Jerónimo Macanás, CEO what they liked with old archive tapes but also of Canadian OTT provider Jump TV. occasionally hard disks as well, resulting “The main disruption is still to come, or disliked.” from detachment of magnetic particles. and it may not even be entirely This leads to small losses of audio or imaginable yet,” reckons Macanás. video data which can go unnoticed by “Imagine a virtual experience that Supervised learning is likely to users. With the help of unsupervised learns from previous ones and creates a predominate in broadcasting for the ML, error correction schemes can fully personalised immersive world of immediate future, according to Johan compensate for the dropout by filling in entertainment per individual. It Vounckx, SVP innovation and data where one is detected. probably isn’t as far off as we think, and technology at live production system it is likely to change the whole maker EVS. “The idea of online Using ML for real benefits entertainment experience.” adaption of a predictive model that Operators though should not get too Application of ML to recomme- continues to learn as it’s being used is mired down in ML technology and ndation and targeting of existing very appealing but may require human should focus on benefits, which come content is very much on the horizon interaction to learn ‘the right way’. For in three broad areas. and is already being done by early example, directors will need to continue “The first is where ML is enabling an adopters. “We see ultra-personalisation, to teach an AI assistant how to make essential task to be completed better, content recommendation and discovery better cuts, by telling it what they liked quicker, or cheaper,” says Paul Shen, to be key factors in keeping users or disliked. Unsupervised online CEO of mobile broadcast equipment engaged with a specific video service adaptation of a predictive model is not vendor TVU Networks. He cites provider in the short term,” says off the table but presents a much more compression as an example, being a Macanás. “Using ML to predict challenging task.” function that has long been performed, However unsupervised learning does but where ML can improve efficiency show promise for applications where by matching bit rate more accurately to “ML will guidance cannot be provided because it varying content complexity to maintain is not clear where an improvement lies, a constant perceptual quality. revolutionise 99% as in finding unexpected patterns or The second category, somewhat trends, or dividing audiences into related, involves application of ML to of the sport market clusters based on behavioural factors or improve efficiency in a task that cost or preferences that depend on analysis of lack of resources has meant either has that has never been large data sets. not been done at all before or not as “Unsupervised ML is ideal for much as a content or service provider captured or delivering more granular and dynamic would have liked. “One example is broadcast before.” customer segmentation, for example,” metadata production at a granular level, argues Peter Docherty, founder and which we’re playing an important role CTO at recommendation engine in developing,” notes Shen. behaviour and make better developer ThinkAnalytics. “Then the third category is when ML recommendations will create a better The need to recognise the different enables something that’s just impossible user experience and improve loyalty to strengths and weaknesses of supervised to imagine with present technology and video brands or broadcasters.”

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Pensieve project: OTT QoE Laboratory (CSAIL) is working on monitoring and improvement the Pensieve neural network, which One example currently subject to is trained to select bitrates for future research is Quality of Experience video chunks based on observations monitoring and improvement over collected by client video players.” OTT services where there is great As Bastian notes, video streaming pressure from operators to cut service parameters have traditionally down buffering, especially for been pre-programmed on the basis live distribution when it is a of assumptions about the server and Macanás also identifies effective greater problem. network environment. “With targeting of ads as fertile ground for ML “One of the biggest complaints of Pensieve, it learns to make adaptive because of the scope for tailoring the viewing video streaming is bitrate decisions solely through process better to individual users’ buffering,” says Chris Bastian, SVP observations of the resulting preferences or prejudices. There is a Engineering and CTO for the performance of past decisions,” says fine line between serving ads that are Society of Cable Telecomm- Bastian. “A Pensieve field annoying and even provoke churn and unications Engineers/International experiment resulted in up to 30% those that are welcomed. “An efficient Society of Broadband Experts less re-buffering and increased way to offer only interesting advertising (SCTE/ISBE). “The MIT Computer Quality of Experience scores by to the appropriate target audience will Science and Artificial Intelligence up to 25%.” come soon, as well as calibrating the optimal ad-pressure to each individual Not all advanced applications in can mix multiple narrow search engines sport market that has never been broadcasting require the most to get better hits on a search. Thus, captured or broadcast before,” claims sophisticated ML algorithms such as ICAs that learn from humans how good Gal Oz, CTO and Co-founder of those based on convolutional neural the matches are can surpass CNNs Pixellot. “The potential is there, and it’s networks (CNN). The key point is that based on real time analysis.” overwhelming. Even if a game has only in the visual cortex of humans and Naturally, voice interactivity is 1,000 viewers, when it costs only a few many animals, individual neurons another big area where ML comes in by dollars to produce it, the market will respond only to local stimuli in the adapting to an individual’s speech change.” Here, ML is applied to associated restricted region of view, so a profile for improved accuracy, as TiVo’s software guiding unmanned multi- CNN is designed on that basis to Ambrozic notes. camera systems in a single fixed rig, combine global analysis with local Many of these ML applications with additional angles as required, processing within the neural network. (including the Pensieve neural network, covering the entire field and delivering This enables granularity to be combined see box out) are focused more on a stitched panoramic image. The with scale at optimum performance for increasing stickiness and reducing algorithms track the flow of play, many real time tasks especially. churn, or else cutting costs. identify highlights, create replays and “CNNs are particularly apt for real insert ads without human intervention, time image analysis, whilst more Revolutionising niche which is particularly important for “traditional” Image Classification content production broadcasting of niche events where Algorithms (ICA) can be used to But one area where there is promise of keeping marginal costs down is vital. process images that are pre-recorded, monetisation for ML lies in the realm “In general, I think we’re just at the for example a scene in a film,” says of niche content production. The idea is start of the journey,” agrees Gideon Jonathan Morgan, CEO of Object that ML makes it economically feasible Gilboa of Kaltura. “For the TV Matrix, a provider of digital content to produce niche content that may not distribution business in particular, the governance software. yield much revenue on its own but gathering, analysis and usage of data is “ICA can be enhanced by learning when aggregated can become very still very new. As an operator once told from humans if the images found are a profitable if production costs are low me, we throw away 50% of the data good match, because a search and enough. One notable target here is immediately and the rest of it we throw semantic algorithm can analyse scenes broadcasting of second and third tier out a bit later.” not just for hard facts, such as ‘this sporting events because these can It is clear, then, that ML holds great scene contains Harrison Ford, a car and generate small but enthusiastic and potential across the broadcast chain and a gun’ but can further analyse what a loyal followings. will be at the heart of a new genre of scene is about. Furthermore, algorithms “ML will revolutionise 99% of the Big Data analytics for TV.

26 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

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Mobility-as-a-service

Special focus on in-car entertainment

27-31_Access.indd 1 22/08/2018 13:58:59 Sponsored feature

Experts Driven to distraction: cars to do predict that cars will soon become an battle for consumer attention open battle ground for The emerging concepts of Mobility as a Service and consumer attention, no longer just a means of self-driving vehicles look set to transform the media transportation, but mobile infotainment landscape as cars become dedicated entertainment ‘pods’ able to provide hubs able to stream music, movies, game and more. a home theater experience, immersive Stephen Cousins reports virtual reality gaming environments, or to ersonal transport is Infotainment and access unique function as a lens to the outside world, at a pivotal point in experiences that adjust to individual using augmented reality to overlay its evolution and users’ tastes and requirements. content and advertisements. media, automotive Autonomous cars, expected to be in As a result, it is likely that most and technology widespread use by 2030, will transform brands will soon require a distribution companies are driving from an active to a passive strategy that takes autonomous cars making the first activity, freeing up traveling time for into account, and some are already Pmoves to exploit the opportunity. leisure. In the United States, drivers making moves to enter the space. The growth of Mobility-as-a-Service spend over 160 million hours going Greg Merchant, Managing Director at (MaaS) and the shift away from from point A to B each day, so the Deloitte Consulting and author of a personally-owned modes of possibilities to exploit that time for recent report on the Future of mobility transportation has opened up new ways additional consumption are now told CSI: “When you think about the to experience and pay for in-car hard to ignore. future inside the car and the amount of

28 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

27-31_Access.indd 2 28/08/2018 16:15:18 Sponsored feature

enable drivers to listen to specific audio analyst at Futuresource Consulting. content or news on demand, or for “The market will be further propelled passengers to watch videos, play games, as passengers in the car become passive listen to music or read eBooks from the and media equipment becomes more comfort of their seat. In future, these integrated. The car will increasingly services will be integrated to the in-car see riders pay less to travel in a car environment. Manufacturers will use whose interior has been transformed knowledge of the consumer’s viewing into Cinderella’s carriage, or an and listening habits and of the journey X-Wing fighter.” For auto makers, and time of day to better personalise Smith thinks such immersive in-car the experience.” experiences could become a key point Content is likely to vary considerably of differentiation and a new basis for depending on the length of journey. competition, over and above traditional Ride sharing journeys, provided by the factors such as engine performance or likes of SmartCar’s car2go and the value added features. recently launched ReachNow from BMW/Smini, are on average 3.5 miles Pedal to the metal long, whereas commutes can vary from According to analysis from Deloitte, consumption, combined with the rise of five minutes to two hours. A family may vehicle-based passengers will be 5G wireless, there is a great opportunity want content for three hours on a cross consuming more than 52 billion hours for media companies - there’s almost no country trip. of media content annually by 2030, sector of media that wouldn’t have a 100% safe autonomous cars and more than double that of today. powerful play to make in this space, related regulatory approvals are But hitting that volume of from education, to music, gaming, still some way off, but automakers consumption will depend on how business information and just in time and media firms know where the rapidly different iterations of thinking. Meanwhile, automotive firms market is headed and making autonomous cars come to market. have a chance to differentiate necessary investments. Immersive Infotainment is unlikely to themselves by providing a superior At CES in January, car manufacturers come when the technology hits the in-car experience.” showed off advanced infotainment road, with Level 3 automation, as systems with connected screens drivers will still be required to pay Road to revolution integrated into dashboards. attention to certain functions or alerts The rapid pace of technological The new Mercedes-Benz User provided by the car. innovation has set the stage for a Experience, or MBUX, infotainment Safety concerns will be reduced as paradigm shift in car design and usage. system, includes two widescreen higher levels of autonomy are The MaaS market has experienced a displays, one to replace the traditional introduced. Level 4 vehicles, expected quick succession of developments. gauge cluster and one for infotainment. early next decade, will be able to drive Ride-hailing services like Uber, Grab Infotainment systems on several themselves in geofenced metropolitan and Lyft have successfully digitalized new KIA models will integrate areas with dedicated lane markings or private transportation, in the process Google Assistant and Google infrastructure. Level 5 cars, able to opening up opportunities for value Home functionality. drive fully autonomously on any road, added services. As the multiscreen landscape will come at a later date, at which point Uber, currently one of the most continues to evolve, the vehicle is likely drivers will be actively demanding valuable start-ups in the world, to become part of that ecosystem, distractions to keep from getting bored. partnered with Spotify and Pandora to consumers will be able to start playback “Media companies have an allow riders to control a driver’s sound on one device and quickly and seamless opportunity to play an active role in system using their smartphones. And in move that same experience to screens shaping this ecosystem and defining the the future we can expect more in-car within the car via a rear-seat in-vehicle experience of the future,” says options personalised to riders’ needs. entertainment unit or the main Merchant. “If they choose to play the Robert Guest, VP of Product In-Vehicle Infotainment (IVI) console. wait and see game, and do not work to Management at ACCESS Europe, a “Consumers are demanding more develop compelling and differentiated provider of software solutions for from their car, expecting an experience products, other start-ups will come connected cars, told CSI: “We are similar to that of their smartphones,” along and leave them in the dust,” already seeing new MaaS services that says James Manning Smith, a research he concludes.

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 29

27-31_Access.indd 3 22/08/2018 14:01:54 Sponsored feature

closely with content can be accessed in the car, Moving up a gear automotive content creators, broadcasters and manufactures distributors can increase engagement by and Tier turning the moving vehicle into an Bringing personalised, multimedia 1s to deliver additional platform for their assets. entertainment to the car. By Dr premium Thanks to ACCESS Twine for Car video content (Twine4Car), our solution for secure Neale Foster, CEO, ACCESS Europe a way that content distribution for connected car can be infotainment, we’re helping to bring the ultiscreen has consumed inside of a moving vehicle. content and automotive industries become the norm This large market has huge potential, together. Twine4Car enables passengers for the broadcast but so far it has been largely untapped to combine their own multimedia industry, but it by the broadcast and video industry. library with the manufacturer’s has traditionally However, with the rise of connectivity catalogue, and adjusts the experience to remained in the and Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) each journey and user, tailoring it to the living room and environments, the automotive industry specific demographics and duration of Mfocused on delivering the same is looking to offer video alongside other the ride. With Twine4Car, we are content to a variety of screens services to passengers. In order to offer enabling drivers to enjoy the type of connected via the set-top box or a these services and to turn the car into infotainment services that previously centralised gateway. an extension of the wider multiscreen only existed in sci-fi films. However, advancements in technology ecosystem, it will require knowledge mean that the range of available both of the consumer’s viewing habits, platforms has increased so much that device of choice, but also of the “In-vehicle consumers can access content around journey. To achieve this, the content the home, on the go and even in cars. and automotive industries will need to infotainment is The connected car industry, in collaborate more closely prior to the particular, is a highly lucrative market general availability of driverless cars. predicted to be for the content industry, with in-vehicle infotainment predicted to be worth over Bridging the gap between the worth over $30 $30 billion by 2022 according to home and the car Research and Markets. Consumers frequently use their billion by 2022, In-vehicle infotainment - or ‘IVI’ for connected TV’s, smartphones, game short - refers to a series of integrated consoles and tablets to access their but the content systems that deliver a variety of favourite content or information. content including information and However, they are unable to extend this and automotive entertainment directly in the car. experience to the car due to the lack of Whilst each IVI system is unique and interconnection between the car and the industries will need performs its own function, typical home environment. This is resulting in tasks that can be performed with many wasted opportunities for engaging to collaborate more such a system include: managing and with consumers beyond the home and closely prior to the playing audible content, such as audio inside vehicles, especially when it books, radio, or music; managing and comes to video content, games general availability playing video content by utilising the and audiobooks. rear-seat entertainment screen or a As consumers introduce more devices of driverless cars.” tablet; displaying content such as inside the car – from smartphones and movies, games, music videos; or tablets through to handheld game traffic conditions, sports scores and consoles and e-readers – being able to Cars are no longer simply used for weather forecasts. With the advent of offer a seamless, yet highly personal commuting from point A to point B. these solutions, the consumer experience on all these screens is Instead, next generation infotainment perception of the car itself is evolving. critical for car manufacturers, and a services enable each journey to become The broadcast and video industry new avenue for revenue for the content a unique multimedia experience. For needs to embrace the zeitgeist of industry. However, the benefits are example, a parent picking up children entertainment in the car by working enormous. By ensuring that their from school in a spacious family

30 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

27-31_Access.indd 4 22/08/2018 14:01:54 Sponsored feature

friendly car with a journey time of less for their entertainment, infotainment also look like a major headache for than 30 minutes will be offered family can help transform the relationship manufacturers looking to offer their friendly cartoon episodes or educational between manufacturers and consumers. infotainment services across the whole games. This differs wildly from a taxi With transparency and if done well, the of Europe. Traditionally, video services vehicle picking up a customer for a EU GDPR can provide manufacturers were only available within specific 20-minute ride inside the city, where with a brand-new way to design services borders, identified through geolocation short-form comedic videos most that respond to specific journeys tools. With the new EU content commonly found on YouTube, casual and demographics. portability rules, consumers will be able games or the latest weather forecast will However, since the new regulations to continue to watch content across be the best options. Through aim to prevent companies from borders, regardless of the number of Twine4Car, content owners will be able sharing their users’ data with third countries they drive through, in a to work with the automotive industry to parties, building and maintaining a similar way to the simple network meet consumers’ expectations for a trusted relationship is essential. switches they already witness on their tailored in-vehicle infotainment Twine4Car ensures automotive smartphones. To do so, manufacturers experience by offering a hyper- manufacturers are in sync with and the content industry need partners personalised experience that adjusts to current privacy regulations, so that that can help them talk the same each journey and user for the duration personalised data will be used only language to secure exclusive – yet fully of the ride. when absolutely necessary for services secure – content deals. such as payment and billing. There is a general consensus that we The next era of connectivity Additionally, it can be designed to are steadily moving towards a fully beyond GDPR request end-user opt-in to use integrated and ubiquitous future. With Today’s connected cars already collect recommendations. This ensures that entertainment at the heart of the future data about each driver and passenger. manufacturers can deliver the most of the automotive industry, a mutual With the recently implemented EU accurate recommendations, and enables focus between manufacturers, Tier 1s General Data Protection Rules the content industry to reach the right and the connected entertainment (GDPR), consumers decide which eyeballs in the best format and at the industry is fundamental in bringing the information will be collected and shared best of times without any negative type of premium multimedia and with manufacturers. By enabling the impact on their brand. entertainment services that consumers end user to select a number of options The EU content portability rules can will want to use in the car.

www.csimagazine.com September 2018 31

27-31_Access.indd 5 22/08/2018 14:02:01 ACCESS Twine™ for Car

Connected Service and Software Solution for Connected Car Infotainment

ACCESS Twine™4Car is a flexible multimedia content service for automotive OEMs. It is made to bridge the gap between the automotive and the content industries and increases the safety, the comfort and the flexibility in content consumption for drivers and passengers.

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For more information, visit eu.access-company.com

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Supplement

COMPRESSION GAMES

33-Compression-Cover.indd 1 14/08/2018 16:26:00 Compression special

approach. Perseus Plus can be deployed Compression games now, and is future proof, since it will just improve once either HEVC or AV1 The battle lines are being drawn in the (or any other base codec) are usable at scale,” claims Murra, the company’s next-generation codec contest, but it’s SVP product and marketing. While V-Nova is building an unlikely a ‘war’ that any of them can win, ecosystem around its advanced discovers Goran Nastic technology it is another market player that has developed a royalty free codec n the 1983 film War Games a conscious consumers and a rapidly that has caused much excitement and young hacker played by growing penetration of UHD TVs in the ruffled MPEG feathers. Matthew Broderick convinces home to take into consideration. a US military supercomputer “At the moment, most operators seem Enter AV1 of the futility of a nuclear war to be sticking with MPEG-2 and The Alliance for Open Media by using the game tick tack MPEG-4 AVC for existing services. The (AOMedia) was founded back in 2015, toe. Through a series of big changes are actually happening for but it was really Apple joining the group Idraws the computer learns of the those which offer streaming. These in January this year that put it in a concept of no-win scenarios as it is companies are looking at where to go wider industry spotlight. a game where in practice there is next in terms of bitrate reduction – The AV1 codec was released in no winner if the players know how either adopting a new codec for Ultra March 2018 by AOMedia when it to play it right. HD or how to push down bitrates for arrived with a frozen code base based The film springs to mind when streaming services on mobile,” says Carl on Google’s VP9 as a foundation. A discussing the current state of the Furgusson, VP of Portfolio month later, AOMedia was out in force compression market because much of Management, MediaKind (formerly at NAB 2018, the first public outing for the conversation focuses on a battle Ericsson Media Solutions). the group. All key AOM members between competing codecs. Unwittingly, “AVC continues to be the primary except Facebook and, less surprisingly, the blame for this can be attributed to codec for lower resolution services, but Apple took part in a panel explaining the onset of AV1, but it is also the watch out for other stalking horses,” the reasons for its support of the strategic significance of compression adds Ian Nock, MD of Fairmile West initiative, the rationale for a new codec that is fuelling the latest debate. Consulting and chair of the Ultra HD and their plans going forward (see Content compression, with its Forum Interop Working Group. Netflix box out). underlying algorithms and quantitative One of these is V-Nova’s proprietary There is consequently a lot of interest predictions, is an engineering-focused codec, Perseus Plus, which leverages in AV1, due to its strong backers, as discipline, but one that, together with existing dedicated hardware acceleration well as its technology choices and IP connectivity, lies at the very heart – and works in tandem with existing market coverage. After all, a large and economics - of media and codecs like AVC/H.264, HEVC, VP9 or chunk of the world’s streaming content production and delivery. in the future AV1. will move to AV1-based encoding. “There is an increasing realisation “At V-Nova we believe we add another “What seems to be different about that there is a need for greater important element to these disruptive AV1 is the breadth of support from efficiency in video delivery and that times by providing a ‘royalty already large internet, computer and device waiting for the rollout of new data paid’ and backward-compatible suppliers,” notes Thierry Fautier, VP of networks and new hardware isn’t the solution. The recent service collapses that several operators, including the BBC and Optus, had with streaming of the World Cup are evidence enough of this,” says Fabio Murra of V-Nova. There is also growing demand for more premium delivery formats like high frame rate (HFR) streaming for eSports and sport in general, as well as

Ultra HD driven by evermore quality- Bitmovin Source: netmarketshare.com Source:

34 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

34-36_Compression.indd 2 HEVC patent ownership distribution 28/08/2018 16:19:56 Source: CPA Global Compression special

video strategy at Harmonic and Netflix: AV1 is our primary service to the members we have,” president of the Ultra HD Forum. next-gen codec Watson said. It is widely expected that we will see Netflix will begin live streaming in AV1 will be used for reaching adoption of AV1 for VoD first, where AV1 by the end of this year and new members in emerging markets real-time encoding isn’t a mandatory said at NAB 2018 the codec will thanks to its proclaimed efficiency requirement. Browsers will be the first help it reach its next 100 million for delivering internet video - even target because they will be the first to members. The world’s largest good enough quality at speeds as have software decoders inside them, SVoD provider used the Las Vegas low as 100kbps, according to including those from Google, Mozilla show to express its satisfaction at Watson (eventually pushing and Microsoft. Native (hardware) the progress made so far and everything in AV1 will have the support in devices is not expected to be outline the company’s firm plans added benefit of slashing CDN available until 2020, so until then it will and roadmap going forward. delivery and storage costs). He be software decoding. This could be a “When we started with AOM, we noted Netflix has integrated the challenge for mobile if that leads to didn’t know we would get all the AV1 encoder into its systems for significant battery consumption. expertise needed to develop the testing purposes. There are some published right codec or get the members to “Every bit that we can save on benchmarks and papers available join or technical results we got,” delivering good quality video already, but it is only once AV1 devices said Mark Watson, an AOMedia means there is more addressable with hardware - Google announced they Founding Board Member and members for us, and that more of were working on a free hardware Director of Streaming Standards our members can get higher acceleration - become available in 2020 at Netflix. quality, HD, 4K and HDR video,” and 2021 that meaningful comparisons “We have a codec now that for said Watson. “You will see higher can be made. These include adoption, Netflix we see as our primary next- quality at lower bitrate. Our licensing, bit rate efficiency, latency, generation codec, the codec that primary interest is compression computational complexity, will help us reach our next 100 efficiency. We’re really excited to parallelisability and availability of million members and the codec see the rollout of our service on mature implementations. that will help us give much better AV1 this year.” Over 30% bitrate reduction has been reported in some cases relative to HEVC, but the trade-off is that it takes computational power,” adding that for others, is pursuing a dual strategy of 2,000 to 3,000 times the computation. OTT applications that encode once and investing in both HEVC and AV1 in As it stands, to get the best out of AV1 stream millions of times, “it makes order to provide customers for any it takes around 177 days to encode one complete sense to do something like future scenario. Harmonic is also hour of video. AV1, even with the high computation working with a partner on real-time Dejero CTO Todd Schneider notes demand.” (Dejero’s adaptive rate HEVC AV1 encoding. that the AV1 codec recently become encoders and customers are typically Those CSI spoke to see AV1 as the practical for offline encoding and non focused on working in very challenging next step in codec evolution, rather real-time OTT applications. “While AV1 network conditions in nomadic and than a seismic revolution. Moreover, may provide better efficiency in some mobile applications.) Fautier warns that the adoption of VC1 instances, our understanding it Harmonic, like Bitmovin, Imagine was stunted because it was unable to demands significantly more Communications, MediaKind and deliver on the claim of being royalty- free. “It will be interesting to see if AV1 will succeed in this area”, he says. V-Nova’s Murra also sounds a warning bell against such tech giants controlling the compression business. “In the long term, I don’t believe that it would be good for operators if innovation only came from large companies who have a highly profitable business model somewhere else in the * Only available in Safari for iOS 11 and macOS High Sierra. value chain and decide not to directly

Source: netmarketshare.com netmarketshare.com Source: ** Only available in Edge 14.14291 monetise their efforts in the video

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codec space. MPEG has a strong Players with broad and strong leadership and has proven over decades capabilities have joined across a number “Is AV1 the best to be a great way to reward investments of different segments and industries — in codec research from every corner of that’s the big news behind AV1. Best codec ever? No, the globe. I believe MPEG can continue codec ever? No, but it’s the next natural serving an important role going step,” says Dejero’s Schneider. but it’s the next forward,” he argues. For its part, HEVC encoding quality Nevertheless, the power of is said to be steadily improving, natural step.” commercial forces should not be especially for live, low latency, and low underestimated and certainly AOM has power applications. There is also this in abundance. AV1 will be adopted improving HEVC interoperability and rolling out otherwise we would just by the big streaming giants such as adoption in end-user devices. For AV1 switch to whatever came next every Netflix, as well as YouTube and to become more broadly adopted and time,” he said. Facebook who are currently using VP9. move into broadcast applications, the For those who think that the situation Even though VP9 royalties only cost industry needs to see prior adoption today is complicated, Ian Nock points $1-2, this adds up to a significant into end-user devices such as back to the 1990s with the development overall cost when streaming user mobile phones. of the original MPEG1/2/4 and VC1/9 generated content to billions of devices. From a practical and cost standpoint, video codecs in parallel with the ‘wild “For me, this is just a natural there is also the issue of upgrading west’ of the Internet codecs coming progression of technology which is all workflows, a legacy bottleneck faced by through such as On2, Sorenson, about disruption. I think the big story any new codec (or indeed any piece of RealVideo and DivX, which also for AV1 is actually the parties that came tech). Broadcasters do have investments ultimately resulted in the creation of the together under the AOMedia banner. in HEVC, mainly for emerging UHD codecs that begat VP6, 8, 9 and AV1. services. They will have to wait for “There are those who either don’t production workflows to be upgraded to know or forget that the AVC/H.264 support the codec on hardware. years of ‘stability’ is the aberration and When CSI spoke to BT and asked having one codec is not necessarily the them about AV1, their new director of optimum situation (there is market mobile strategy, Matt Stagg, was theory based on a rule of threes),” practical in his assessment. “I guess on Nock says. any distribution but especially on The current level of codec uncertainty mobile if you can get the same quality is not unprecedented, agrees Fautier, for less bitrate it’s a win-win; customers but there is greater uncertainty now get a better picture and our CDN costs than there was during periods when the go down. But there is cost to all of these industry smoothly transitioned to the things and there would be the cost of next MPEG codec. moving to different codecs versus what “It is an interesting time for codec the return on investment is. There’s a evolution, where changes in the decoder whole business case to be looked at lifecycle could change the established there and the cost and complexities of dynamics around codec longevity,” surmises Fautier.

MPEG fights back with VVC (and MC-IF) The old formats are by no means dead and there is life left yet in MPEG-4 AVC, HEVC and even MPEG-2, which are all still best suited to a lot of scenarios because of large-scale deployed decoding devices. There seems to still be much opportunity to make further enhancements in MPEG-2, MPEG-4, HEVC, and many commercial

36 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

34-36_Compression.indd 4 28/08/2018 16:20:48 Compression special

reasons to do it. Nevertheless MPEG AI, machine learning and other developments in machine learning could not stand still and is preparing encoding innovation and artifical intelligence. VVC (versatile video coding) as the Unsurprisingly in line with wider “AI and machine learning are successsor to HEVC. industry trends, there is a migration interesting developments for A new committee called MPEG VVC of encoding towards software encoding. Broadcasters are looking was set up in May 2018, which is (software-defined encoding) and at machine learning to try to create seeking to improve compression cloud-based architectures and the secret sauce of decision making efficiency by 40% to 50% relative to environments. Customers continue and help to inform which tools to HEVC. The VVC spec will be frozen to gravitate towards software-based use at which point in time for next year and expected to become an platforms for compression for encoding,” says Furgusson. international standard in 2020 (some reasons of flexibility and scalability He adds MediaKind is seeing observers think this timeline is a little to target precise functionality for the positive results with machine optimistic deadline given the history of specific application at hand, learning processes in terms of video MPEG releases). including choice of optimised pre-processing, either to remove It is also expected to offer a more codecs per use case. compression artefacts or video adoption-friendly royalty model “Software-defined technology up-scaling or detail enhancement. compared to the much maligned HEVC is seen as the route to a future-proof However, the challenge with (see pages 38-39 for more details on architecture which supports machine learning is that it takes a HEVC patents and licensing). multiple deployment models. And it huge amount of processing power “A tool-based selection approach for can be implemented in an to actually implement in a product, VVC was adopted at the last MPEG appliance, as a virtual machine in which means it comes with a meeting in July, and we can expect the machine room or in a data large cost. modular tools to be available and centre, in the cloud or in hybrid There are also other applications associated royalties to be part of the systems,” explains Tony Huang, for machine learning, particularly in codec. This is a departure from HEVC, global director product line video pre-processing – the process which bundles all the tools together in management compression at of cleaning up already compressed profiles; therefore, it opens up Imagine Communications, which video as moving artefacts before the opportunities for pay-per-use codec tool provides its Zenium software next compression stage. utilisation. This will enable operators to architecture to customers in Pre-post processing pairing can trade off efficiency of the codec vs cost this space and has a technical team also improve the compression of licensing,” says Fautier. working on underlying algorithms. efficiency, according to Fautier. According to MediaKind’s Furgusson, Among the other encoding trends, Faroudja (now licensed by V-Nova) the entrance of the AV1 codec has there is unanimous agreement in claims 50% bandwidth savings, but “reset the expectations” on royalty fees compression circles that Content MPEG has so far decided not to for HEVC. If an operator is trying to Aware Encoding, together with standardise the pre/post processing stream to millions or billions of devices, Context Aware approaches, will functions. This approach, though, even that one or two dollars of royalty become more widespread in use, might only work for vertically adds up to be a significant cost. “For as they can adjust to the content integrated solutions, such as Netflix, those developing VVC they are going to and also optimise bitrate allocation, Amazon and Apple, which control have to take the royalties into account and they will be augmented by the entire chain, argues Fautier. and consider the level of basis at which they are trying to charge royalty for that codec,” he points out. Huang at Imagine believes it is too Grandl at Bitmovin. “The way forward That will prompt a whole new round early to make a prediction on the next- is a hybrid multi-codec approach. of debates about what the royalty generation codec battle. “Different There’s an opportunity to build out situation is going to look like with the technical and business cases, including support for HEVC, VP9 and AV1 that next MPEG codec. Licensing is such a choice of codec. Our job is to offer a deliver higher quality video, for a hot topic that the industry has agreed to flexible and scalable product differentiated service offering.” create an extending entity, the Media architecture that makes it easy for them It seems foolish to bet on just one Codec Industry Forum (MC-IF), to to implement their decisions, whatever winner overall and, at the risk of mixing deal with profiling outside of MPEG. the choice of codec, and to do so in a movie analogies, it is highly unlikely This new organisation will be consultative manner.” that there will just one codec to rule announced at IBC2018. It is a statement echoed by Reinhard them all in the future.

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and display devices in High Effi ciency Video Coding the future, adoption remains slow – at least CPA Global on how the ecosystem is evolving in part due to a complex licensing scenario. PA Global completed compression ratios of coded content a high-level analysis compared to the previous standard AVC Taking ownership of High Efficiency (H.264). These compression efficiencies Of the 993 relevant HEVC patent Video Coding (HEVC) allow broadcasters and media families identified through the analysis technologies through companies to create better quality video of 6410 patent families, most are still patents that relate to streams with larger resolutions at the owned by the companies and institutes HEVC technology. same bit rates of previous generation involved in the first stages of CCPA Global identified all patents codecs. This reduces the overall cost of development. These companies include related to HEVC and patents video asset delivery and focuses on Qualcomm, Samsung, LG, Mediatek declared in various patent pools improving the viewing experience. and Huawei, however, there are of HEVC. Broadcasters wanting to transmit approximately 75 other companies and A total of 6,410 patent families were programmes in 4K face the challenge of institutes that now own patents defining identified and manually reviewed by needing high quality broadband the HEVC standard. CPA Global technical experts to identify the major reception. This is where HEVC comes experts analysed the patent ownership players in the industry and offer insight in. HEVC makes broadcasting 4K more information for all the 993 relevant into licensing costs, market trends and feasible by reducing the cost and time it patent families and approximately 12% future challenges and solutions for takes to deliver high quality of patent families were found to have corporations exploring HEVC. programming. HEVC delivers an been reassigned and transacted as part average bit rate reduction of 50% of patent acquisition deals. A significant move forward in video compared to the previously adopted Panasonic has transferred the highest compression technology standard of H.264, transmitting the number of patents to other companies HEVC was developed to provide smallest amount of information in this technology. Initially, when there efficient compression for resolutions necessary for a specified level of video was only one patent pool body, beyond high-definition television. The quality. This saves bandwidth cost and Panasonic assigned five of its patent HEVC standard describes complex enables higher quality television families to Tagivan II LLC in 2014. algorithms for motion estimation, frame delivery over the internet. Later, it sold 34 of its patent families prediction and the partitioning of While the technology is anticipated to relevant to HEVC to Sun Patent Trust. coding block units, resulting in doubled be used in almost all video processors GE Video Compression bought all (seven patent families) of its HEVC related patents from German research organisation Fraunhofer. About 75% of Dolby’s HEVC related patent families (nine families out of 12) have been bought from entities such as Sharp, France Telecom, and Broadcom. Patent families help identify the scale and scope of a patent’s protection – giving insight into a set of patents taken in various countries to protect a single invention. Of the 460 patent families, 321 were found to be relevant to the 8-Bit profile of the HEVC standard. These 321 patent families constitute just about one-third of all (993) patent families that were identified as relevant to HEVC in the complete study. The chart HEVC patent ownership distribution Source: CPA Global above illustrates the counts of patent

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38-39_HEVC.indd 2 28/08/2018 16:34:30 Compression special

Chart shows relevancy of patent families declared in HEVC patent pools. The table below shows patent transactions. and competition from technologies such Source: CPA Global as AV1 and AVS2. AVC technology, meanwhile, remains popular and is still used extensively. In his recent blog, Leonardo Chiariglione, the founder and chairman of MPEG expressed his concerns on the ‘broken’ business model of MPEG. The patent royalties collected from such licenses are meant to allow inventors to develop future generation video coding standards. But the complex licensing structures created by the patent pools and the availability of ‘royalty-free’ technologies like AV1 is threatening this model. The emergence of different patent pools has hindered the patent owners from clearly defining the coverage and scope of licenses. Several of the major technology owners like LG and Huawei have not joined any patent pool, and other companies including Samsung and Mediatek have declared only a portion of their relevant patent portfolio in one or more of the patent pools. In fact, only one third of the relevant patents have been declared in the patent pools. Even with partial declarations, the licensing costs being charged for HEVC are significantly higher than what was being charged for AVC. A device families declared by companies that the patent pools cover only one-third of manufacturer may have to purchase have at least 5 patent families declared the patents relevant to the main profile multiple licenses from different patent in various patent pools (by height of of HEVC) will further increase costs pools, increasing the costs by several bar), and the portion of these patent and complexity. times, and still not receive complete families that were found relevant to the patent protection. Main profile (by purple trend line and What is next for HEVC? The industry may find it difficult numerical value mentioned). The trend in video consumption today to adopt the H.265/HEVC standard Interestingly, the ownership of several clearly shows that the quantity of video due to the complex cost structures of patents has changed in recent years. material distributed over broadcast patent pools. Almost two thirds of Analysis of all 993 relevant patent channels and digital networks is going relevant patents are not covered by families found approximately 12% had to increase in years to come. As a patent pools and some are not been reassigned or transacted as part of result, the viewers’ demand for better transparent with their licensing a patent acquisition deal. resolution and higher quality content is structure which may slow down HEVC is already significantly more driving the efforts of the technological adoption rates of this technology. expensive than AVC for any device development. The question that the industry faces manufacturer selling more than five While the demand for better quality today is what will be the future of million units. The fact that a licensee content is clearly here, HEVC HEVC considering the concerns may need to purchase licenses from technologies are being adopted at a around its licensing and increasing different pools and from companies that slower pace than expected, largely as competition from technologies are unaffiliated with these pools (since result of uncertain licensing structures like AV1?

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38-39_HEVC.indd 3 28/08/2018 16:34:40 Compression special

duplicated to offer different Make codec peace, not war adaptive streaming profiles across By Guido Meardi devices, costs begin to sky rocket. demand for large-scale events. So, It’s this view of the industry that what is the answer to address these drove V-Nova to adopt a hybrid problems today? approach with our PERSEUS Plus Once upon a time, most expected this codec that leverages existing dedicated would be the time for HEVC and in hardware acceleration and works in some cases it absolutely provides the tandem with existing codecs like AVC best option today. For example, for 4K (or HEVC etc). This approach enables VOD delivery to Smart TVs where all devices with hardware decoding for HEVC hardware penetration is strong, the underlying codec (eg, AVC/H.264) it makes sense. Netflix deliver 4K at to be software updated to receive about 15 Mbps and the output is substantially more efficient video superb. However, the complexity of the compression without impacting codec means that for live 4K encoding power consumption. With no new where fewer “tools” can be enabled, you hardware blocks in the silicon there need in excess of 25 Mbps to achieve are no additional device royalties to comparable results. This dramatically pay. Also, and crucially, a single he popularity of reduces the viewers who can receive it adaptive streaming workflow can framing the and therefore the business feasibility of address all devices whether they have discussion about operating that service. been updated or not. True 100% video codecs in our Meanwhile, HEVC’s rollout continues backward compatibility. industry as a war to stutter mostly due to uncertainties In summary, it’s clear that we have to between rival groups about the liabilities on royalties that be more creative and to stop waiting for seems to show operators or device manufacturers are the one-size-fits-all solution that will Tno signs of abating. But it’s signing themselves up for. With 3 patent never come. Our contention is that increasingly clear that if this is a holding groups (one of whom hasn’t given the current challenges in the war there is no chance of there announced pricing) and further IP codec space, it’s time to embrace the ever being an outright winner. holders yet to declare themselves, there strength and universal device Different codecs suit different is an unquantified financial liability penetration of AVC/H.264 and adopt workflows or use cases and to deliver that only the largest organisations are effective approaches like PERSEUS the ultimate OTT service with a range willing to accept. Plus that leverage it and provide vast of resolutions across every device, Right now, there is a lot of buzz improvements of quality, customer today, you need to use more than one. around AV1 which sets out to be reach, reliability and cost efficiency Given the reality of the bandwidth we royalty-free. A very welcome without waiting for new hardware. All all actually have for streaming compared introduction given the concerns around of the codecs under discussion have (or to advertised bandwidths, it’s clear that HEVC. However, with its specification will have) their place in the ecosystem, the need for rapid improvements in only finalised earlier this year, it is but it’s critical to move things forward compression efficiency over native several years from having any now rather than later. That way we can H.264 is present right now. In testing meaningful hardware penetration, and all avoid the dreaded buffer wheel and conducted by V-Nova in 2017 across the early encoder implementations are enjoy a higher quality video experience. multiple fixed-line and mobile yet to prove the potential quality gains. V-Nova will be exhibiting at IBC on connections in the UK, well over a Furthermore, a few large IP owners are stand 14.C36 third of viewers were typically already claiming that AV1 will constrained on average to less than ultimately not be royalty free, which 1Mbps of bandwidth where the quality- may slow down its adoption in low cost

of-experience is poor with H.264. devices such as mobile phones. Guido Meardi is CEO & Co-founder, The service collapses seen during If we return to the hypothetical V-Nova the recent World Cup are further ultimate service, it’s clear that you need evidence of the need for change to deploy different codecs for different Sponsored by: given that the current infrastructure and use cases. For operators this is far from codecs employed cannot meet the ideal because as soon as workflows are

40 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

37_Nova.indd 1 28/08/2018 16:01:22 Analyst corner

is expensive unless you are targeting a Pay-TV households still very niche audience. Overlap of users across the major SVoD services is strong. In the UK, half outnumber SVoD homes of Now TV subscribers also use both Analysing the major trends in the SVoD space Netflix and Amazon Prime, in the US, two-thirds of Hulu subscribers do the he momentum in However, in the US, this gap is same, according to Futuresource’s subscription video on closing, where there will be 98 million Living With Digital consumer survey. demand services Pay-TV households at the end of 2018, There has also been a renewed (SVoD) uptake has compared to 79 million SVoD approach in a number of European continued during households – which is equivalent to an countries to pool resources; similar 2018, with Netflix and impressive 62% of all households. companies working together to provide other services Australia is the only major country a much broader, compelling service. Tcontinuing to reach new where there are more SVoD households One such initiative from French customers, with the scale of than Pay-TV households, partly driven commercial broadcasters TF1 and M6 uptake and the competitive by the comparatively high price of Pay- Group plus public broadcaster France environment providing some TV services and the impressive success Televisions, will see them collectively intriguing comparisons by country. of Netflix in the country. launching a new national TV platform, Futuresource’s latest SVoD This growing trend of multiple SVoD Salto, that integrates free catch-up analysis highlights that total SVoD households is against a backdrop of a services and new SVoD options. subscriptions are on course to dynamic competitive landscape. These new services will help drive reach 450 million worldwide by Although competition in the SVoD multiple SVoD services and potentially the end of 2018, driven in sector is intense, many services provide a ‘Pseudo’ Pay-TV mentality particular by less mature markets, complement each other rather than from consumers. Our digital survey including China. compete, as the content is typically suggests that cord cutting is evident One of the key emerging dynamics in different by service. But if a service is with switching to SVoD service a key this growing sector is the increased not complementary and has few reason to shift. With younger age number of households taking more than differentiating factors, gaining and groups also more reluctant to commit one SVoD subscription. This is maintaining consumers can be a to Pay-TV contracts, commitment-free particularly strong in countries where struggle, even among services which and lower cost SVoD services are an there are at least two, but typically three are well established. attractive option. For example, in the or more, established services, with the UK, the survey suggests that among US, China, Japan and UK all fitting High profile service closures 16-25 year olds, 25% say that an SVoD this criteria. The recent announcement that service is their most frequently viewed Therefore, there is a clear distinction CanalPlay is to close in France is video platform, compared to 13% between the number of subscriptions another reminder of the growing amongst the overall base. (450 million by end 2018) and number requirement for major content With Amazon Channels already of ‘SVoD households’, which are set to investment to compete in the offering over 100 SVoD services via its reach 280 million households increasingly dynamic subscription platform, multiple SVoD service uptake worldwide by the end of this year. video sector, particularly among is set to increase further, placing further With continued pressure on the Pay- local services. pressure on the traditional Pay-TV TV sector, this SVoD households figure There have been a number of high service paradigm. provides a more accurate comparison profile SVoD service closures in recent with Pay-TV households. It also years in addition to CanalPlay, Shomi indicates that SVoD still has some way (Canada), Watchever (Germany) and to go to become the dominant form of KPN Play (Netherlands). video and TV subscription in most Differentiation against Netflix and countries. By the end of 2018, other leading services such as Amazon David Sidebottom is Principal Futuresource estimates there will be Prime Video is key; a starting point for Analyst – Media and over 1 billion Pay-TV households any service is in offering content that is Entertainment, futuresource globally, over double the number of unique, high quality and ideally, SVoD households. exclusive or original, but this approach

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15_Analyst_Column.indd 2 16/08/2018 10:33:52 Nanosats

globe, will be used to Small and smaller backhaul information from objects located in The nanosatellite market is booming and becoming areas that are not served by terrestrial networks crowded with new entrants. Goran Nastic reports and offer redundancy on existing terrestrial ow Earth Orbit (LEO) investment fund into emerging network coverage. satellites - and technologies. Myriota is its first Eutelsat will be using technology specifically LEO investment in a company outside of the from Sigfox, which runs a global nanosatellites - are all US and the tenth since HorizonX narrowband network dedicated to the the rage suddenly, started in April 2017. IoT. Like others, the satellite operator spurred on by the UK-based Sky & Space Global, sees LEO as particularly well-suited to march of the internet meanwhile, is stepping up efforts to narrowband connectivity for objects Lof things (IoT) and onset of 5G in bring nano-satellite narrowband services Hispasat this year invested in LeoSat, the future. LEO providers believe to the Caribbean region as part of wider seeing a growth opportunity as the satellite will have a strong role to plans for equatorial communications. satellite TV business stagnates. play in complimenting global Over the equatorial region, the company Back with Boeing, the company is connectivity, especially in estimates that between 2.5 billion and also acquiring Millennium Space traditionally hard to reach areas. 3.5bn people have limited access to Systems, a provider of agile, small- One such company is Myriota, which reliable infrastructure and that, of these, satellite solutions. MSS has developed has developed technology enabling two- 750 million have no access at all. Apart high-performance satellites for exacting way communications between ground- from internet connectivity, they are missions from 50kg in weight. Small based micro-transmitters and LEO expected to provide a wide range of satellites are typically under 100kg in nanosatellites to securely share data services, such as tracking, disaster mass and size, with nanosats in the over narrow bandwidths. This direct-to- management and grid monitoring 10kg category (there are also picosats orbit platform is aimed at applications among others. below 1kg). Another name for some of across the logistics, defence, utilities, SAS plans to deploy a constellation the smallest satellites is CubeSat and agricultural, environmental and of 200 sophisticated nano-satellites over they all have short operational lifetimes maritime industries. the Equatorial Belt and they are ranging from a few weeks to years. “We formed Myriota to solve a major expected to be fully operational in orbit MSS was founded back in 2001, connectivity problem: hundreds of in 2020. Going forward, the company showing just how hot a space this sector millions of devices that need to plans to upgrade and replace 25% of its is all of a sudden. The market for small communicate but don’t have cost- constellation every year. satellites will more than double to reach effective, battery-friendly networks to do Even Eutelsat, previously a sceptic of 375 satellites launched per year, so,” said Myriota CEO Alex Grant. LEOs, has commissioned its first nano- according to NSR. Partly it is the The firm’s ambitions have found satellite, due for launch in 2019. improving launch economics and favour with Boeing’s HorizonX Eutelsat LEO for Objects (ELO), capabilities, including manufacturing, Ventures, the aerospace company’s located in orbit 500-600km above the that is helping fuel the new boom. For example, Orbex emerged from stealth mode this summer with plans to launch renewable fuel-based small satellites from a UK spaceport in Scotland. This activity, of course, brings new risks. With more and more constellations being deployed in LEO, collision risk is a significant consideration for insurers given the heightened probability of debris impact in LEO, warned Swiss Re in a recent report. Orbital debris makes up over 90% of the tracked objects orbiting the Earth today.

42 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

42_Leo.indd 2 28/08/2018 16:03:07 IBC EXHIBITION RAI, AMSTERDAM | 14-18 SEPTEMBER

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CSI Perspective 204 x 271.indd 1 29/05/2018 16:12 Technology corner

usually sent in the Ku From Antenna to Receiver: (10-18 GHz) or C-band (3-6 GHz) or a Transmission and distribution of satellite combination, depending on local and regional environments. A growing signals in large facilities number of signals around the world are hether in order to guarantee maximum being broadcast at Ka-Band (20/30 a cable reliability and uptime. GHz). The direction of the electric field headend, Satellite Earth Station antennas, often of the received electromagnetic wave is earth station referred to as satellite “dishes,” are used called polarization. The Vertical and or teleport, for receiving satellite signals from Horizontal polarization are reliable television programming networks at perpendicular to each other. The signal cable head ends and other facilities. separation is performed by an antenna Wtransmission and distribution Their size may vary from 1 to as large feed, which feeds the signals to a Low is the backbone of a facility’s as 30 meters in diameter, depending on Noise Block Converter (LNB). successful operation. From signal the frequency, satellite position, and The LNB (Low Noise Block Down reception at the satellite dish, to service requirements. Converter) frequency converts the weak processing and distribution within Source: WikiImages / pixabay.com signals received from satellites and a facility, and final distribution, The signals are transmitted from space amplifies them for delivery via cables to signal quality availability must be to earth at different frequencies and indoor reception and decoding properly engineered and managed. polarizations between satellite and equipment typically racked with other Redundancies play a key role in ground antennas. Television signals are electronic networking units.

44 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

44-46_TechCorner.indd 2 16/08/2018 15:44:28 Technology corner

The high-frequency input signals fibre is much more difficult to tap received (or downlinked) from the than copper. satellite in space are typically down The conversion of an LNB output converted by the LNB to the L-band signal onto optical fiber usually takes (950-2150 MHz) or extended L-band place in dedicated devices that are (850-2450 MHz) frequency range and housed outdoors in the rack shelters at transmitted via cable, such as coaxial an antenna site close to the antenna. copper cables. Specially shaped Compact units are typically used, such antennas provide the ability to mount as RF equipment supplier DEV more than one LNB to receive several Systemtechnik’s DEV 7152 outdoor different satellite positions chassis (See Figure 2). Devices simultaneously. mounted directly on the mast of the Lightning protection devices satellite dish are also in use. These directly installed on the antenna, devices can provide redundancy features or in the downstream signal path, for the link to the IRD (Receiver) in can be used in order to protect addition to performing electrical-optical equipment in the downlink chain conversion. They can also be used to set from over-voltage damage. important parameters for onward transmission of the downlinked signal. several fixed position antennas. This Transfer to the receiving device antenna failure backup restoral can (Inter-Facility Link / IFL) Redundant transmission be accomplished using a Redundancy The next step is the transmission of and antennas Switch typically installed in an antenna down converted signals from the LNB In order to ensure continuous signal rack shelter. to the Integrated Receiver/Decoder (or availability, even in the case of failure of It is also possible to install the IRD), which processes and decodes the a part of the transmission chain, routes switch behind the optical fiber signals to baseband. This link is are designed redundantly. If a section of transmission link. sometimes called the Inter-Facility Link the route fails, a backup can take over If the redundancy switch detects a or IFL. The electrical transmission over the signal transmission of the failed malfunction of the signal from one of coaxial cable from the LNB often leads part. Implementing one redundancy the fixed antennas, the ACU points the to attenuation losses, especially at unit for each transmission part (a motorized steerable backup longer transmission paths. Amplifiers so-called 1+1 redundancy) would lead (redundancy) antenna to the faulty are commonly used at the beginning of to an increase of costs. Since backup antenna’s satellite position. Once the route to compensate for losses. equipment is only required in the rare peaked on the correct satellite, the Otherwise, the signal level and Signal- case of a primary path failure, a more backup antenna can receive and restore to-Noise Ratio (SNR) can be too low to effective solution is to implement an the signal in place of the faulty antenna. ensure proper signal quality. N+1 redundancy. With N+1 The signal outage is thus minimized. For antennas and systems with redundancy, “N” number of primary For operators that do not have a transmission paths of less than 100 units can share the same (1) management system that can perform meters from LNB to IRD, transmission redundancy unit, thanks to intelligent the switching automatically, or do not over coaxial cable introduces minimal switching devices on both sides of the wish to perform the integration, there is losses and is typically acceptable for transmission line. a special solution from DEV cost reasons. For larger cabling The concept of hedging against Systemtechnik: the DEV 1993 Antenna distances, or for systems with multiple dropouts with redundancy is not only Redundancy Switch monitors and antennas, where bigger line losses over applied to transmission lines. Antenna switches the signals of connected coax would result, RF-over-Fiber fields can also be protected against antennas, and it can completely take transmission delivers major advantages failure. A motorized steerable backup over the control of the ACU in the case and should be used. In addition, if a antenna can be employed to restore of a dish failure. As a result, it creates a particularly high signal quality is failure of 1 to N number of fixed (non- closed, automated system for achieving required, coaxial IFL links may not be a steerable) antennas in a facility. antenna redundancy without the need prudent option. The backup antenna, controlled from for an external management system. In general, fiber optic transmission an Antenna Control Unit (ACU), can advantages include dramatically higher be pointed to different satellite Site diversity bandwidth capacity and security as positions in order to restore one of Failures are not only caused by

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44-46_TechCorner.indd 3 16/08/2018 15:44:34 Technology corner

any line losses. DEV Systemtechnik is a key supplier of equipment for RF signal distribution, switching and amplification functions, offering unique solutions in a single chassis.

Matrix switching: operating efficiency, control & redundancy Another, much more flexible option than “hard wiring” a facility is to use a Matrix Switch. This makes it possible to switch an input source to any number of outputs, or vice versa. With an RF Matrix Switch, it is no longer necessary technical defects. Severe weather events Multiplexing) are typically used to to manually reconfigure the cabling or can affect entire antenna farms, due to bandwidth-efficiently combine and patch panels in order to change signal attenuation of satellite signals caused by transport the signals from the antenna paths. Redundancies, optical-electrical rain and atmospheric moisture, which Diversity Site to the main site. With conversion, and amplification can more severely attenuates higher satellite CWDM or DWDM, using different all be executed by a Matrix Switch. frequencies (Ku-Band, Ka-Band). wavelengths, up to 16 or 80 different The device can be controlled remotely However, since outage-causing signals can be transmitted over a single via a web browser or by an existing weather effects tend to be optical fiber. At the RF-over-Fiber management system. geographically localized, a concept receive location a demultiplexer divides RF signal routing requirements called Site Diversity can be the multiplex back to individual within a facility differ, depending on implemented to maximize uptime and channels and paths. The switching the application. For programming minimize weather effects. With this Site between the antenna sources acquisition, incoming satellite and/or Diversity approach, a redundant can also be managed by a 1+1 fiber RF signals are transmitted to IRDs downlink antenna facility is built in redundancy switch. (Integrated Receiver Decoders) to another location, typically at least 50 to decode the video, and/or feed it to the 150 kilometers away. RF-over-Fiber Distribution inside the facility cable or IPTV system multiplex. If an (RFoF) is used to link the two sites. To distribute, demultiplex, transport, IRD fails or suffers faults, the Matrix The redundant facility would and switch RF-over-fiber signals within Switch can be used to feed a backup typically be smaller, possibly unmanned, and between facilities, different IRD, or duplicate and route a problem and may only include the primary approaches are viable, depending on signal to test equipment for testing and satellite dishes, outdoor equipment the application and operator fault isolation. and shelter. At the “Diversity Site”, preferences. The classic version is a On the outbound transmission side, the downlinked electrical signals are hard-wired distribution: the incoming matrix switches can also be used to converted for fiber transmission, RF signals are fed to the electrical- route signals from IRD sources for multiplexed and sent to the main optical converters on a splitter. forward distribution, for example to headend receive equipment via fiber Integrated amplifiers are mostly used modulators for direct transmission onto optic links. here, since splitting reduces signal an HFC (hybrid fiber/coax) cable Since the purchase of fiber optic power. For instance, the signal level network, or to IPTV encoding and telecommunications service may be drops by about 3-4 dB with a 1:2 multiplexing systems for downstream required for the fiber connection, and splitter. A distribution of 1:128 distribution to set tops. this can incur a costly recurring fee, corresponds to an attenuation of methods such as CWDM (Coarse approximately 26 dB. This very Yannick Zeller, Systems Engineer and Tom Wavelength Division Multiplexing) and significant loss due to splitting must Beutelspacher, Business Development DWDM (Dense Wavelength Division be addressed in addition to Manager, DEV Systemtechnik GmbH

46 September 2018 www.csimagazine.com

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14 September 2018 Amsterdam

Congratulations to this year's fi nalists www.csimagazine.com/awards

Best digital video processing technology Best interactive TV technology or application AVIWEST - HE4000 encoder with QUAD CellLink 3SS - 3READY Android TV Custom Launcher transmission solution Sixty - Ease Live AWS Elemental - Quality-defined Variable Bitrate Control SoftAtHome - Addressable TV Brightcove - Context Aware Encoding TiVo - Conversation Services

Best network delivery technology Best mobile TV technology or service ARRIS and Stofa - First Deployed DOCSIS® 3.1 CSG - Ascendon Remote-PHY Network in Europe United Cloud - EON Black Box - Emerald Unified KVM Dejero - CellSat Best internet TV technology or service MobiTV - Connect Platform Accedo / Telstra - Telstra TV2 Nevion - Virtuoso Simplestream - VOD-in-a-Box 2.0 Vector Technologies - CCAP Core Simulator (CCS) United Cloud - EON Vimmi Communications - Low Latency CDN Vewd - Vewd OS

Best monitoring or network management solution Best TV everywhere or multi-screen video Bridge Technologies - Instrument View Broadpeak - nanoCDN multicast ABR Skyline Communications – DataMiner Kaltura - TV Platform for Cloud TV SoftAtHome - Eyes'ON Matrox - Maevex 6150 Quad 4K Enterprise Touchstream - StreamEnd-to-End Encoder Appliance Net Insight - The STCC Live App, enabling live motor Best content protection technology sports fans to experience the future of television Edgeware - Forensic watermarking Telekom Slovenije - Neo smart living platform NAGRA - End-to-End Content Value Protection with United Cloud - EON the NAGRA Security Services Platform Best data and analytics innovation Best content on demand solution Datazoom - Adaptive Video Logistics Alpha Networks - tucanoRED Kaltura - Kaltura TV Platform: Targeted TV Solution Brightcove - OTT Flow X, Powered by Accedo ThinkAnalytics - ThinkVoice Simplestream - VOD-in-a-Box 2.0 Viaccess-Orca - TV Platform with data analytics features

page forty eight www.csimagazine.com Awards 2018 CSI magazine • Awards

48-49_Awards.indd 2 01/08/2018 14:05:11

Best cloud or virtualisation innovation Best TV user experience - Operator deployment Aspera - IBM Aspera On Cloud Amino Communications - AminoTV for DNA Oyj TV-hubi Avid - Avid | On Demand Com Hem - Tv Hub AWS Elemental - AWS Media Services DOTSCREEN - Custom Android TV User Interface Harmonic - Harmonic’s VOS 360 media processing SaaS Freesat - Watch From Start Make.TV - Live Video Cloud for ESL One Cologne Medialaan and Yospace - Non-Linear Startover with Dynamic Ad Insertion Best IoT/smart home or 5G technology Zappware - NeXX 4.0 deployed for WIND VISION in Greece ARRIS and Vodafone - Touchstone TG3442VF DOCSIS 3.1 Telephony/Data Gateway IP playout InterDigital - FLAME project Harmonic - Spectrum X media server Telekom Slovenije - Neo smart living platform Rohde & Schwarz - R&S VENICE Verimatrix - Vtegrity Timeline Television - MAM System

Best TV user experience – product innovation Best data storage solution Accedo - Accedo AR Avid - NEXIS | E5 NL ADB - graphyne2 Personalization Hub Disk Archive Corporation – ALTO NAGRA - OpenTV Signature Edition – ION Multi-Journey MediaKind (formerly Ericsson Media Solutions) - Video User Interface Storage and Processing Platform Ruwido - TICTACTILE.system TEDIAL - Evolution aSTORM SoftAtHome - ImpressioTV Verimatrix - Verspective Intelligence Wiztivi - Wiztivi Creative Studio Best use of AI or Machine Learning in video Conviva - Ecosystem Module IBM Watson Media - IBM Watson Video Enrichment and IBM Watson Captioning Sky News - The Royal Wedding ‘Who’s Who Live’ Application TEDIAL – SMARTLIVE

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page forty nine CSI magazine • Awards Awards 2018 www.cable-satellite.com

48-49_Awards.indd 3 28/08/2018 16:04:13 Show preview

Viacom and Wonderhood Studios. Neal Mohan, Chief Product Officer at IBC 2018 preview YouTube, kicks-off the afternoon Conference sessions on Friday 14 CSI highlights some new things to look out for at September and his keynote also heralds this year’s show the start of IBC2018. Logistically, the big news for this year is the opening of the new North-South metro line, which has been a long time coming. This will cut travel times and it is promised that now visitors will be able to arrive from central Amsterdam to the RAI in just a few minutes. There are 15 exhibition halls and among the new exhibitors are China’s Alibaba Group, the sixth largest internet company in the world. This year, IBC is collaborating with IABM on the Future Reality Theatre (pictured), which will present new ideas ow in its 51st year, which attracts debate from the creative, and spark the debate for change. Demos IBC expects to operational and commercial sides of will include a number of technology bring together over media businesses. As a result, it has advances, such as Web-VR applications, 57,000 attendees specialist days in the conference which object-based media scenarios, pathways from more than 170 attract those from the telecoms to 8K resolution for UHD, and countries to industry, for example, or those charged Artificial Intelligence in broadcasting, Amsterdam in mid- with managing cyber-security. This also as well as the world’s first NSeptember. Alongside the show’s includes the Leaders’ Summit, which intercontinental ultra-wide vision core broadcasting focus it is was introduced to engage at CEO level. (UWV) transmission between South managing to expand and broaden This was and is set up to help CEOs Korea and the Netherlands. its scope to reflect changing understand what the technology allows To get there, IBC have partnered with industry dynamics. In the earliest them to do. Air France and KLM to offer attendees registrations for IBC2018, To create further impetus, IBC has discounts of up to 15% on a wide range organisers noted they are seeing formed a new conference steering of public fares on all Air France, KLM “measurable growth” in visitors group, chaired by Keith Underwood, and their code-shared flights worldwide. from key adjacent markets like COO of Channel 4 in the UK. They At time of going to press, there was telcos and cloud. have guided the team to create six new no announcement on what this year’s “Alongside broadcasting the industry conference tracks focusing on the most Big Screen movie would be. is expanding, and IBC’s value as a pressing challenges. They have also global forum is expanding, too. It is the added new formats into the conference, one event which combines real debate like breakfast briefings and lounge talks. 4K charity run and knowledge exchange with hard- Tim Davie, CEO, BBC Studios, will The 4K 4Charity Fun Run is a 4km headed business,” IBC CEO Michael take the opening IBC Conference (2.49-mile) run and walk event raises Crimp states on the opposite page. Keynote on Thursday 13 September funds for organisations supporting IBC has long been proud of being a and Jean-Briac ‘JB’ Perrette, President diversity and inclusion initiatives. venue where real business is made and and CEO, Discovery Networks This year, all proceeds will benefit a deals are closed every year; 38% of International (DNI), will keynote ahead Stichting NewTechKids and attendees make final purchasing of the afternoon’s Global Iridescent. On-site bib pick up opens decisions, according to Crimp. Gamechangers stage on the same day. at 6:15 am and the race will begin at IBC is generally moving away from Among other keynote speakers are 7:00 am on Saturday 15. being an engineering-based event to one those from Amazon/Amazon Alexa, More at https://4k4charity.com/ibc

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IBC-Preview.indd 2 28/08/2018 16:41:28 IBC 2018 Q&A Q&A Michael Crimp Michael Crimp, CEO of IBC, runs through some of the highlights and new things to look out for at this year’s show

helping exhibitors and visitors alike to of the story in the same place. Indeed, plot their course through the latest in the last stage of development in IBC technology. We work to foster a sense of was a move away from an engineering- engagement across the global industry. based event. Keith Underwood, this year’s guest What is new at IBC2018? chair for the content steering group,

Michael Crimp, CEO, IBC Crimp, Michael IBC is the world event for media. brought in some of his own contacts, Nothing else comes close. The same and talked to others. Having access to since the first IBC 51 years ago is the high level address books in this way Michael Crimp, CEO, IBC Crimp, Michael recognition that our visitors are seeking brings us a huge amount of insight. knowledge. When IBC started, Why are trade shows important in exhibitors were selling big devices: it What are you most excited about our industry? Are we seeing a drop was obvious what they did, and the for IBC2018? in interest? captions alongside the big boxes talked It is the opening (finally!) of the new I still believe people have a real need to in terms of technical specifications. North-South metro line. Now visitors meet, to talk face to face. In our Today, large numbers of the products at will be able to get from central industry we are dealing in extremely IBC are software packages of some sort, Amsterdam to the heart of the RAI in complex systems that use technology to whether running on dedicated just a few minutes. It will be a great drive creativity and commerce. It is not hardware, standard computers or relief for those who dread the crowds the sort of industry where a quick in the cloud. Exhibitors have to on the number 4 tram, and it will slash Google search will find an off-the-shelf innovate to showcase their products journey times. product, so getting together with and their unique selling points If all that multiple potential partners, in the is on the stand is a keyboard, a screen What are the technological trends right environment to do business, is and a mouse it is not immediately you are most excited about? really valuable. obvious what you are selling, let alone I think we will see big advances in areas If you look at the structure of the why yours is different to the like artificial intelligence, 5G and media and entertainment business, we competition’s offerings. blockchain. But the real excitement have a tiny handful of really big Smart exhibitors are finding new ways comes when these raw technologies are suppliers, a few middle-sized vendors, of telling their stories. We see many put into action. IBC puts these ideas in and a long, long tail of small, more putting theatres on their stands so front of people who can imagine the specialised and extremely valuable they can present the philosophies possibilities and create the applications companies. This structure has been behind their solutions, perhaps that transform our creativity and our around for as long as I have been in the introducing users who have successfully business models. industry, and it works. adopted the technologies. It is all part I see that the industry is no longer One of the reasons that it works is of telling the story. bound by its technology, but by the that it depends upon collaboration The IBC Conference was founded on desire to find new and engaging ways to which naturally feeds innovation. IBC technical papers, and they remain tell stories, and to monetise those is a great place for those collaborations absolutely central to the programme. efforts fairly and equitably. Those, I to be incubated. This year, though, they are being woven think, will be the key messages debated Unlike some other exhibition more closely into broader sessions, so at IBC this year. One of the key reasons organisers, IBC is not passive. We work that the underlying technology is to come to IBC is to poke around in the hard to create an environment for handled alongside the operational and corners of the exhibition and find these knowledge exchange and for business, business implications, putting all sides new ideas.

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