Key Themes at IBC 2017

Also, while at the show, please come listen to my panel on VR - Creating fans and transforming brands @ IBC 2017 Future Reality Theatre 16 September 16:50-17:50

The International Broadcaster Conference (IBC) 2017 is open in Amsterdam September 14th to September 19th; last year the event drew about 56K professionals. ABI Research has been speaking to a variety of vendors – really a few themes are the most important in terms of what will happen at IBC 2017.

• Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) applied to technology, media and entertainment (TME) – see related insight for full details.
• Low Latency Streaming is a must-have item for sports as well as live TV. This is changing a variety of streaming workflows and encoding protocols, and big names such as YouTube are now promoting this feature set.
• Technology stack integrations will be driven by the increasing role of broadcasters in video distribution, leading to both partnerships and M&A.
• The shift to cloud-based workflows will be visible in both middleware / user experience (UX) solutions, as well as a shift from traditional device-based security to piracy prevention and monitoring services.
• The shift to mobile video services will be a topic of significant discussion at IBC, but not by all the major vendors.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) applied to technology, media and entertainment (TME) – see related insight for full details.

Low Latency Streaming is a must-have item for sports as well as live TV.  This is changing a variety of streaming workflows and encoding protocols, and big names such as YouTube are now promoting this feature set. Low latency streaming started to come on the scene about 18 months ago.  Aligning OTT streams with broadcast streams requires about 8-10 seconds from the origin feed to the playout, while typical OTT packaging formats, buffering and distribution typically require 40-60 seconds.  Other applications include social applications, in which video producers can take questions from the audience of live experiences in near real-time, or in Asia, where this takes the form of e-Commerce transactions.  Finally, betting is another application in which very low latency is required.  One early vendor was Net Insight, who did integrations for a number of racing leagues such as Formula One, based on integrations performed by Tata Communications.  Akamai also made significant low latency streaming announcements at NAB 2017.  Wowza, one of the core providers of encoder software to online video platforms (OVPs) as well as media companies via its licensed platform.  Wowza is increasingly also hosting a cloud encoding solution.  Harmonic’s announcements targeted at IBC include Low Latency as a feature set. 

Technology stack integrations will be driven by the increasing role of broadcasters in video distribution, leading to both partnerships and M&A. These technology stack integrations will manifest a few ways.  Providers that don’t have a full technology stack are announcing pre-integrations with partners with complementary products.  Good examples include Access’s integration with Verimatrix to provide a full protected middleware solution, or Technicolor’s integration with the Metrological application platform.  Meanwhile, major broadcasters will continue to buy into technology stacks, such as the recent Disney – BAMTech controlling investment.  With every announcement, such as Lionsgate tapping into the Vimeo platform, one must evaluate if it’s a pilot project, a strategic partnership (likely true for Lionsgate-Vimeo), or big enough to justify a controlling interest.  These deals tend to be hard to predict, but no doubt another major media-led acquisition will be announced at IBC.  Major acquisitions within the vendor ecosystem to complete an end-to-end workflow, or between the production and distribution sides of the house, could also be evident.  Finally, those with mostly a complete solution will be moving in a turnkey direction, which is more completely described in the shift to cloud-based workflows, below.

The shift to cloud-based workflows will be visible in both middleware / user experience (UX) solutions, as well as a shift from traditional device-based security to piracy prevention and monitoring services in the conditional access (CAS) and DRM domain. From the middleware domain, examples include Accedo One, Nagra’s IntuiTV product, Viaccess-Orca’s announcement of Consolidated Communications (using content preparation by Olympusat), Espial’s launch of the Elevate SaaS platform, and more.  One major announcement that came out leading up to the show is Nagra’s announcement that it was the system integrator for StarHub’s next generation broadcast platform, from headed through distribution. From the content protection side, both Irdeto and Nagra have significantly shifted the dialog from device protection to content protection services.  Both have publically announced enforcement actions arising from content protection services.  While both have advanced capabilities, it’s fair to say that Nagra’s public announcements have been more North-American centric and relied more on OTT services, while Irdeto’s public announcements have been more in Europe and emerging markets and have included a mix of control word sharing and redistribution.  Verimatrix also echoes the importance of content protection services – although it has less public announcements of enforcement actions compared to Nagra and Irdeto.  

The shift to mobile video services will be a topic of significant discussion at IBC, but not by all of the major vendors. Many of the media houses at IBC, and many of the technology vendors, are somewhat slow to move into the mobile domain.  Of course, you’ll see more mobile-centric announcement at other shows such as mobile world congress in Barcelona.  Examples of leaders in this space include Huawei, Ericsson, Nokia, ZTE, Qualcomm and Intel who are all promoting 5G networks with promises of advanced video services.  Most of them also have media units – of course Ericsson’s media unit’s future is vastly uncertain while Nokia is focused very narrowly on video delivery (as well as Nokia Technology’s Ozo investment on the future of VR capture).  At IBC, you’ll see primarily compression solutions – notably V-Nova who has established a leadership position in low-bandwidth video delivery by eschewing standardization in favor of functionality. In addition, Ateme announced a 5G fixed wireless access (FWA) trial with Arqiva and Samsung for 4K video content.  Also, Harmonic has invested in its EyeQ optimization products for low latency.  Most encoding vendors, also, have robust just-in-time packaging solutions which help ease multi-device video services.  Two leaders in this space include Amazon / Elemental as well as bitmovin.  

The wildcard, in terms of how much it will be on people’s tongues – is virtual reality.  Please come and hear my panel on VR (details in the introduction).  In that panel, we’ll review our thoughts on 360-degree Video, Interactive and Immersive Content we’ll discuss the use cases of VR, some of the reasons it helps to find resonance in the market, and then discuss some of the technical barriers to VR distribution.

We know content producers are using VR for marketing production, experimentation, and in live music and sports.  We’re eager to hear from those in the industry how much their plans are looking at the future of interactive and immersive content, and how they are hoping to help VR move past the teething stages.  That’s something that will be surprising – we hope for the better!