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Six Things to Consider When Evaluating Cloud TV Platforms

cloud tv platform

 

Given the speed with which it has reshaped many industries, including our own media and TV industry, it is fairly astonishing to consider that cloud computing in its modern form is under a decade old. Amazon Web Services announced its Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) in August 2006, thus popularising the term and stating that “Amazon EC2 changes the economics of computing by allowing you to pay only for capacity that you actually use”; Gartner released its influential report Cloud Computing Confusion Leads to Opportunity in June 2008 and says that cloud computing would become as influential as e-business and in the years since we have traveled to the point where cloud apps will account for 90% of total mobile data traffic by 2019.

It has been a remarkable journey, and in many ways, it is only just starting. Device virtualization is seeing the consumer becoming increasingly reliant on services stored in the cloud — media files are perhaps the most obvious examples; PVRs are definitely heading there once the legal ramifications can be worked out (see Daniel Hesselbarth’s comments in our report on ‘How Time-Shift And On-Demand Is Evolving, And The Challenges And Opportunities That Await’).

Meanwhile, for businesses, we are seeing the unstoppable rise of “XaaS” - Everything as a Service. That means that whole industries are suddenly finding themselves engaging more intimately with the cloud than ever before, and broadcast is not immune.

The cloud’s impact on broadcast looks set to increase in the near future, too as the next wave of progress starts to hit and we see the emergence of Television as a Service, which brings with it the promise of operators being able to run entire broadcast channels in the cloud.

The reasons to manage a TV  in the cloud  (Cloud TV) are many - from improved business agility to reduced Time to Market to ecosystem adaptability — but as ever with the cloud there are things to consider before moving forward. And with our expertise in the area, we’ve come up with the following list of six things to consider:

1. Delivery

A service needs to be completed. Once content is uploaded to the cloud, a TVaaS provider needs to be able to provide everything from transcoding through packaging to encryption and distribution. As well as utilizing adaptive streaming protocols (MPEG-DASH, Microsoft Smooth Streaming, and HLS) effectively. Content also needs to be available for consumption on as many platforms as possible via various front-end applications.

2. Management

Everything should be in one place, ideally enabling all aspects of content, customer, business management, and more to be overseen from a single service. This reduces technical complexity, allowing you to manage your service efficiently and effectively while maintaining low costs. A TVaaS provider that can offer all relevant technologies from an in-house team rather than via multiple vendors has the advantage here (and also guarantees faster innovation cycles).

3. Engagement

The importance of maximizing viewer engagement is well understood in the industry. Effective personalization and content discovery are some of the best ways to achieve this, especially if the solution in question can work seamlessly and consistently across all devices.

4. Monetization

With reduced Time to Market being one of the prime reasons for deploying Television-as-a-Service (TVaaS), off-the-shelf business models that allow you to introduce and launch new services as part of your multi-screen offering in simple, swift steps are crucial. Subscription VOD, new channel packages, catch-up, start over…all these should be available and the service provider should be in a position to continually innovate on its service offerings as the business landscape changes.

5. Security

Content security is often cited as the number one reason for not implementing cloud-based solutions. Any technology looking to distribute content to a mixed media ecology of STBs, tablets, consoles, phones, and other connected devices needs to use a suite of responsive, multi-DRM technologies that can combat piracy as it evolves in turn.

6. Real World Testing

Once you move your TV Everywhere service into the cloud, you are no longer purchasing a solution, but an ongoing service, and it’s vital to check that it is the correct one for your business. Being able to work on the actual backend as it will appear in the final service and see the results on the front-end apps — ideally with no obligation in a free trial —  gives you 360º visibility over the decision-making process and the ways that Television as a Service can fit into your future strategic decisions.

There are other factors to consider too, such as the rather pertinent matter of cost. But, on the whole, any solution that can deliver on all these six points is a compelling one.

To try out the most comprehensive TV as a Service platform, check out our solution here, or simply contact us and request a free 30-days trial!

TVAAS solution

 

Efrat Fenigson

Efrat Fenigson was the Senior Director of Marketing Communications at Viaccess-Orca. After several years as a computer programmer, Efrat understood her passion is not in creating technology, but rather in creating conversations about it. Previously, Efrat founded and ran the “New Media” sector in the Israeli Export Institute (IEICI), helping hundreds of Israeli start-ups take their first steps in global business. Efrat blogs about the pay-TV and over the top (OTT) markets, about users' behavior and expectations in today's multi-screen and second-screen reality, and about content protection/piracy. Efrat holds a BA in Computing from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia.
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