Broadband and TV: a tale of two cables

Conference review
This year’s Cable Congress marked yet further proof that
cable is evolving from TV towards broadband infrastructure.
Goran Nastic reports
Broadband and TV:
a tale of two cables
I
n Europe at least, it is increasingly clear
that the cable industry’s strategic focus has
shifted to broadband, a message reinforced
at this year’s Cable Congress in London,
an annual gathering of the industry’s great
and the good which attracts around 750 or
so delegates every year. Around 20% of the
region’s broadband homes are connected via cable,
which creates a large opportunity to play for and
one that MSOs are aggressively looking to
penetrate further, mainly in the residential market
but also the largely untapped business segment.
The stall was set from the show’s opening press
conference, where the message was one of a telcoand network-centric future. “The industry is at a
major crossroads of technology and content. The
narrative of the cable industry is changing from a
fundamentally TV business to a telecoms service
industry,” said Cable Europe president Manuel
Kohnstamm, perhaps prescient of a long-term
16
May-June 2013
future where TV delivery becomes internet based.
Cable Europe data showed growth in
broadband and telephony services but a decline in
the overall cable TV (CATV) subscriber base as
competitive pressure – and perhaps a
consequence of this change of narrative - takes
their toll.
Official figures compiled for the industry group
by IHS Screen Digest showed broadband revenues
increasing 6.5% on the back of subscriber growth
of 8.4% to just over 27 million broadband
customers. Together with a healthy growth in
telephony the two now reached almost half of all
cable industry revenues at the end of 2012, a big
change from a decade earlier when TV ruled the
roost.
It also shows that cable’s aggressive investment
in broadband infrastructure, especially Docsis 3
technology, is paying off. Cable operators now
offer average customer broadband speeds of
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32Mbps in Europe (30-50 is seen as the marketing
sweetspot), which is a greater headline rate than
DSL across Europe. To further boost
competitiveness, MSOs are now also aggressively
pursuing even faster speeds with the Docsis 3.1
standard (see page 14), which will allow cable to
deploy Gigabit services over existing HFC
networks and migrate to higher bandwidth
services based on market demand while making
more efficent use of spectrum.
Cable has long prided itself on the number of
tools it has in its toolbox without needing to
invest in costly FTTH infrastructure and it is this
flexibility that insiders believe give it an advantage
over competitors.
On the other hand, it was also revealed that the
total number of European CATV keeps falling as
users switch to IPTV (and OTT) platforms, while
DTT and satellite remain robust.
What about TV?
So where does all this leave cable television? TV
services seem to be seen by the industry as merely
a way of adding to the value in terms of multiservice offerings. Premium and exclusive content,
moreover, has been traded off to deliver
everything in a more agnostic way.
Conference review
During a Q&A session on the first day of the
conference, Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries was
asked what plans the cablenet had in terms of
sports and other content, in light of the company
becoming the world’s largest cable operator once
its acquisition of Virgin Media closes at the end
of May. His response was telling; “Our philosophy
historically has been that we’re in the business for
open access not exclusive for content. I don’t see
us competing with Sky for sports content or
football rights in an aggressive way across most of
our markets. It’s also not in our strategic plan to
start investing massive amounts of capital in
content providers. Content will flow to the best
platforms and it will flow to consumers through
those platforms and it will end up on their TV
sets,” said Fries.
Some analysts believe this unwillingness to
match satellite in terms of content or indeed
rolling out new TV related technologies might
cost cable dear in the long-term.
“The cable industry is caught in a pincer
movement between higher value, technologyleading satellite services, and free DTT services,”
wrote Strategy Analytics analyst David Mercer in
his blog, noting that cable’s real strength lies in
broadband.
Predominantly, it was competition from telcos
that contributed the main talking points. The
following comments made by various MSO
executives paint a good picture:
• “Having gone through the heavy lifting of
investing in core networks, cable is now
ready to reap the rewards.”
• “Cable’s strength is the changing nature of
Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries interviewed on stage
about acquisitions and cable’s future direction
“Superfast broadband
is as important as
canals and railways
were in the past.
Digital services are
the new arteries for
our economies.”
broadband, that’s been our ‘hero product’.”
• “We have Gigabit capability coming to a
Docsis network near you soon.”
• “We are investing 26% of our revenues in
CapEx every year and most of it is on fibre.”
To this end, the message was also that
cablenets should get more cosy with national
governments to ease regulatory burdens against
the might of telco incumbents.
Of course, television still matters – which
explains Liberty’s investment in Horizon, Virgin’s
progress under TiVo and Zon underlining the
importance of its ‘Iris’ UI - to the vast majority of
customers, so cable must deliver to those
expectations in one way or another.
“As connected home technologies converge the
opportunity to build on cable’s broadband
strengths will increase, but content rights battles,
the key competitive challenge, are here to stay,”
added Mercer.
Back to the ‘dumb pipe’?
As Fitch Ratings agency highlighted in a recent
research note: “Cable operator’s revenue and
EBITDA growth has been increasingly reliant on
high-speed data products. In contrast, their legacy
video services continue to experience negative
pressure in revenue and margins. Ultimately a
growing consumption of data will lead to
measured data service for cable connections. This
scenario could drive cable operators to focus
solely on growing data usage on their connections
The official Cable Congress party, held at the London
Film Museum, with local beats and vibes
to customers through owned and third-party
applications even at the expense of their own
retail video services.”
Cable Europe’s new executive chairman,
Matthias Kurth, was right when he noted: “It is
clear from Cable Congress this year, that the
future has much to offer, but one thing is for
certain – we must keep the pressure on, keep
innovating, and keep the customer at the forefront
of everything we do.”
So for all the bullish enthusiasm on display
over the three day event (and to be sure, the cable
industry has much to be proud of in terms of how
it has reacted to new challenges and continually
reinvented itself), this should serve as a warning
against any complacency.
But operators are stuck between a decision of
being innovators, and those that see the value of
simply being a ‘dumb pipe’ given competition
from OTT, high content costs and thinning
margins (an estimated 70% of an operator’s CPE
costs are tied to the STB). As Parks Associates
put it, should MSOs extend through value-added
services, or refocus on their core provision of
bandwidth capacity? The answer is still very much
up for debate.
Cable Congress 2014, likely to be held in
Brussels as the EU capital becomes the event’s
semi-permanent home, will be a good marker as
to whether cable’s strategy of open access to
content through superior networks continues to
pay off or whether it shows that a change in
thinking is required.
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
17
Here comes DOCSIS 3.1
may/june 2013
2nd screen
synchronisation
MPEG-DASH
& HEVC
CDN roundtable
OTT QoS
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Contents
it needs is a killer app. And how do companies
choose between the ACR techniques out there?
22
OTT QoS
Managing service quality over unmanaged networks
and devices requires a radically different approach to
traditional TV distribution. How can this be guaranteed in light of all the variables?
12
24
Analyst corner
As pay TV channels look to go to advertising supported models, Guy Bisson gives his verdict on the best
potential markets
14
27
CDN roundtable
CSI assembled a diverse panel to look at the current
and future market for content delivery networks
COVER STORY - DOCSIS 3.1
Get ready for the new Docsis standard - coming to a
network near you sooner rather than later
16
Guest column
The DTG on the importance of the Future Innovation
in Television Technology (FITT) Taskforce
34
Teleports
We examine the future prospects of teleport services,
which are evolving in new and different directions
Cable Congress review
Broadband continues to displace TV as cable’s focus
18
42
Second screen synchronisation
Synchronisation technology will see a boom, but what
MPEG-DASH
The streaming standard aims to unify but it faces a
struggle. Dolby gives its view on page 38
Editor’s report:
Spectrum, what is it good for (to paraphrase Springsteen)? However, rather than being
good for absolutely nothing as The Boss sang, the battle lines are being increasingly drawn
over this scarce and precious commodity between existing terrestrial TV services and
emerging wireless broadband technologies who see it as very useful indeed. The dispute is
not a new one but has recently reared its head again, albeit for different reasons, in the UK
and Germany. In any case, these discussions ask profound questions about the long-term future of the
DTT platform (see pages 24 and 27). Cable, meanwhile, realising that the future is IP-based, is to even
greater degrees boosting the efficiency of its networks and plants to be ready for Gigabit speeds as more
and more video is pushed down broadband pipes (see pages 14 and 16). Goran Nastic, editor
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CSI Awards 2013
Call for entries
There are 18 coveted Awards up for grabs this year and remember you are welcome to enter
multiple categories.
1. Best outside broadcast or playout technology or service
9. Best content-on-demand solution
2. Best digital video processing technology
10. Best interactive TV technology or application
3. Best cable or fibre contribution/distribution/
transmission solution
11. Best IPTV technology or service
4. Best satellite contribution/distribution/transmission
solution
5. Best monitoring or network management solution
6. Best customer premise technology
7. Best workflow/asset management/automation
solution
8. Best content protection technology
12. Best mobile TV technology or service
13. Best HDTV technology or project
14. Best Web TV technology or service
15. Best Ultra HD TV Technology or project - NEW
16. Best TV Everywhere/multi-screen video
17. Best Social TV technology, service or application
18. Best Contribution to TV Accessibility - NEW
The winners will be announced at an awards ceremony on the 13th September 2013,
IBC, Amsterdam.
ENTER NOW: www.csimagazine.com/awards
For Sponsorship opportunities contact:
For judging or entry enquiries:
Tiro Bestonso, Commercial Manager
Tel: +44 (0)20 7562 2427
Email: [email protected]
Goran Nastic, Editor
Tel: +44 (0)20 7562 2416
Email: [email protected]
News
Bulb TV turns on 4k
Canadian television network Bulb
Television has become the first
channel in North America, and
one of the first in the world, to
announce plans of a 4k ultra HD
feed, with launch as early as next
month, and 8k also in the pipeline
before the end of next year.
Bulb TV has been transmitting a
4000 pixels feed for internal testing
over the last several weeks and will
be releasing the signal in 4k, 1080
HD and standard definition formats
when it launches in May. The ultra
HD format is four times the
resolution of a typical 1080 high def.
Content will begin to be produced
in-house and acquired in the 4k,
while content airing that was filmed
in 1080p will be up converted. The
4000 pixel feed currently streams at
around 50mbps.
The company is also first
broadcaster to announce plans to
launch an 8k version of the channel
when technology permits, namely
once the H.265 codec and encoders
become readily available, “ideally as
soon as fall 2014”.
According to its blurb, Bulb
Television “will be airing intellectual
programming of conferences and
shows with substance in a nontraditional format.”
“The idea came up several months
ago that if we’re building a new
news in brief
master control anyway, let’s
be the first to break ground
with this new revolution
technology as well,” said
founder Evan Kosiner.
Bulb TV is set to launch
in markets across Canada
on cable, satellite and IPTV
platforms in May and June.
Operators who cannot immediately
carry the new 4k format will have
options to carry a 1080 signal or
SD signal.
• SES has launched an Ultra
HD Experience initiative to drive
the development of the value chain.
Content producers and
broadcasters are invited to submit
ultra HD footage via www.ses.com/
ultrahd-experience and will be
given the opportunity to broadcast
via an SES satellite.
Amazon working on STB
Amazon is developing its own settop box to support its streaming
video services. The device, due
later this year, will connect to
TVs and also provide access to
Amazon’s expanding video
services, including the company’s
VoD store, making use of its
existing content and billing
relationships to move even more
into the living room. Amazon has
introduced several original
television pilots for customer
feedback as it looks to expand its
services. The STB is being
developed by Amazon’s Lab126
division. The move would pit the
retail giant against the likes of
Apple TV, Roku, and Xbox, as
well as Intel, which is launching
its own OTT STB this year.
News
Tablets outstrip phone iPlayer requests
news in brief
Swisscom TV abroad
Swisscom TV plus customers will
be able to access and watch
recorded programmes up to 30
days old while abroad using their
smartphones, tablets, laptops and
PCs. More than 80% of the
operator’s TV plus customers
regularly record programmes and
they will be able to watch these
outside of Switzerland as of 29
April. The company also said that
iPhones and Android
smartphones can now be used as
TV remote controls. Forward
EPG search functionality has also
been added.
DT caps monthly data
Deutsche Telekom will be
introducing monthly data caps for
new fixed broadband customers
next month, in response to
surging consumer demand for
data. From 2 May, monthly data
allowance will be based on
specific packages. If the volume
limit is exceeded, then the data
rate will automatically drop to
384kbps for the rest of the
month. On average DT’s
customers currently use between
15GB and 20GB of data per
month.
Twitter and viewer tune-in
Social TV analytics company
SecondSync has integrated
overnight TV ratings from BARB,
the UK’s audience measurement
service, into its dashboard
platform in order to gain an
understanding of the relationship
between social TV data and
audience figures. The move
means that for the first time
broadcasters, programme-makers
and advertisers can see the
minute-by-minute relationship
between social TV activity and
audiences, and determine to what
extent Twitter drives tune-in,
according to the company.
06
May-June 2013
The BBC’s iPlayer catch-up
service has for the first time
seen more requests from tablets
than smartphones.
The catch-up service saw
200,000 more requests from
tablets than from smartphone
devices in March. The BBC said
that, tablets and smartphones
combined accounted for almost a
third (30%) of all iPlayer requests,
or 81 million requests in total.
Daily requests among
smartphone and tablet owners
also reached a daily record of an
average of 8.1 million. Weekly
requests peaked at 60 million in
the second week of March.
Overall, iPlayer received 200
million TV requests and 72
million radio requests in March.
The Top Gear: Africa Special was
the most watched iPlayer programme
throughout March, with 5.7 million
requests across the two-part show.
The BBC recently reported that it
would offer some content on iPlayer
before it is broadcast on TV, part of
a 12 month trial where 40 hours of
programming will be made available
in this way.
• Some 150 million tablets are
forecast to ship globally this year
worth an estimated $64 billion,
according to ABI Research, a sales
growth of over 38% year-over-year
About 60% of last year’s tablet
shipments used Apple’s iOS software
while 37% were based on Google’s
Android OS. The remaining 3% OS
share consisted of Windows,
BlackBerry Tablet OS, and
unidentified OS implementations.
“The tide is definitely turning toward
Android-based tablets,” said the
market researchers.
Sky: UltraViolet needs simplifying
Sky’s head of movies has dismissed
the UltraViolet standard for now,
arguing the proposition is too
complicated for both studios and
consumers in its current form.
Speaking at IHS Screen Digest’s
PEVE Entertainment 2013
conference this week, Ian Lewis,
director of Sky Movies and Sky
Box Office at BskyB, said the
payTV operator is interested in
how the market is developing but
has no imminent plans on coming
on board.
“UltraViolet is not quite there
yet. It’s great the industry is
looking for single format to engage
population but I’m not sure even
Hollywood studios are aligned with
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what it is,” said Lewis.
“It’s too complex and difficult to
explain to people. VHS and DVD
took of once resolutions were
reached. UltraViolet on the other
hand is quite complicated. Not every
film people buy is available through
that route and there is a fear among
customers about compatibility. Going
forward it needs to be simpler and
more customer focused,” he argued.
A day earlier at the same event,
DECE’s Mark Teitell explained how
the digital locker will be launched in
France and Germany by the end of
Q3, with other European markets to
follow. UltraViolet has so far rolled
out in the UK, Australia, Canada and
New Zealand, while 9,000 titles from
seven Hollywood studios are
available in the US.
Sky’s Lewis also echoed gripes
from other service providers that
content windows need to be
rethought in a converging
marketplace. “In digital world it
feels much harder to sustain existing
artificial release windows. “We need
to embrace opportunities that digital
has to offer. Constructive
experimentation is needed with
windows and we see huge benefits of
a big launch moment than staggered
releases,” he said, arguing that new
payTV business models can help
mitigate declining DVD sales.
Lewis added that the company
does not see its new Now TV
internet TV service as a direct
competitor to the likes of Netflix and
LoveFilm. “We are competing in a
different space to OTT providers as
we are premium service with
premium content.”
Sky Movies has been available for
six months on Now TV, while Sky
Sports has just been added, as have
single day purchases giving
customers 24-hour access for £9.99.
“We are very pleased with how Now
TV has started,” asserted Lewis,
despite the internet TV service
having been plagued by technical
issues since it launched last year.
Technology
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News
Netflix and DRM in HTML5
news in brief
YouTube iOS streaming
Google has updated its YouTube
iOS app to version 1.3, which
adds support for live streaming.
The mobile app for Apple devices
now lets users watch video live
on-the-go, a feature previously
reserved for PC-based viewing.
Other improvements in the new
version include quick access to
new uploads from subscriptions,
and the ability to queue videos
for playback on TV.
Cyfrowy tests Dolby Digital
Cyfrowy Polsat is testing one of
its own HD channels - Polsat
Sport HD - with Dolby Digital
Plus with the aim of enhancing
viewers’ overall experience and
quality and service. Dolby Digital
Plus delivers up to 7.1 channels
of cinematic surround sound,
with scalable sound delivery and
a wide range of bit rates for
optimised sound quality and
bandwidth efficiency.
Pace to supply Horizon STB
Liberty Global has selected Pace
as the second set-top box supplier
for its media server gateways to a
number of its operations in
Europe. Samsung manufactured
Horizon boxes have so far rolled
out in Dutch and Swiss markets,
with Ireland and Germany among
the new territories to follow.
Smart energy specs
The ZigBee Alliance has
completed its Smart Energy
Profile 2 specs, which will take
ZigBee into millions of connected
devices such as smart meters or
home security systems. The
ZigBee SEP 2 provides IP-based
information and control for
energy management in HANs
(home area networks), for both
wired and wireless networks and
supports any IETF IP- protocol.
08
May-June 2013
Netflix has said it is moving towards
HTML5 as the basis for next-gen
video playback on the web as it
looks to replace Microsoft’s
Silverlight streaming technology.
Netflix uses Silverlight to deliver
streaming video to web browsers on
PC and Mac devices but as
Microsoft is phasing Silverlight 5
by 2021 it has decided to move
towards HTML5 video to remove
some of the disadvantages of
browser plug-ins, such as limited
device support.
The company has been working
with Google and other W3C
partners to implement support for
so-called HTML5 Premium Video
Extensions in the Chrome browser,
and has just started using this
technology on the Samsung
ARM-Based Chromebook. The
player on this Chromebook device
uses the Media Source Extensions
and Encrypted Media Extensions
to adaptively stream protected
content.
Netflix said it will remove the
last remaining browser plugin as
soon as WebCrypto is available
directly in the Chrome browser, at
which point it can begin testing its
new HTML5 video player on
Windows and OS X.
“We’re excited about the future of
premium video playback on the web,
and we look forward to the day that
these Premium Video Extensions are
implemented in all browsers,” it
wrote in a blog.
Earlier this year, Netflix had
together with Google and Microsoft
submitted to the W3C consortium a
draft proposal - entitled Encrypted
Media Extensions (EME) - for a way
to add DRM to video played through
HTML5, a move which came under
much criticism from many quarters
on ethical grounds of an open
internet.
Netflix claims HTML5 will help
it more easily reach a variety
of connected devices
Like other companies, Netflix is
aware that a number of other
components are needed for HTML5
to be able to deliver premium quality
video. Media Source Extensions and
the Web Cryptography API are
among the additional draft proposals
under consideration with the W3C.
But it is also feared in some
quarters that proposals from Google
may not result in a level playing field
in terms of different protection
mechanisms (particularly with
regards to the company advancing its
own technologies inside its OS and
Chrome browser). To this end,
Netflix is seen as simply moving
from one proprietary technology in
Silverlight to another that is
embedded in Chrome browsers on
certain platforms.
All the companies that CSI has
spoken to about DRM in HTML5
(whether directly or via plug-ins)
suggest it is too early to tell what the
outcome of the W3C process will be.
It is understood, however, that
discussions around standardisation
are political with contributors
inside the body deeply divided
on the issue.
Connected TV falls under EC’s eye
The European Commission has
begun a public consultation on
connected TV to help it decide
whether regulation is needed in
specific areas.
It issued its own green paper on
the subject and asked stakeholders
to comment on what the
convergence of internet and
broadcasting could mean for
Europe’s economic growth and
innovation, cultural diversity and
consumers.
The European legislation most
likely to be affected is the
Audiovisual Media Services
Directive, which aims to ensure a
www.csimagazine.com
single market across Europe for the
television and audiovisual industry.
The green paper adopted
questions whether the current
approach to regulation will be
appropriate in the future. One of the
questions raised is the
interoperability of connected TV
devices using standards such as
HbbTV; for instance, whether a
product purchased in one member
state will work the same way in
another.
It includes issues such as
supporting European businesses in
competition with especially US
companies to win new markets,
changing financing models for TV,
films and other content; open access
to content, and protecting user
interests such as children and those
with disabilities.
“Connected TV is the next big
thing in the creative and digital
world,” said Neelie Kroes, the vicepresident of the European
Commission, who is responsible for
the Digital Agenda for Europe.
“Convergence between sectors means
people can enjoy a wider choice of
great content — but it also creates
disruptions and challenges.”
The consultation is open for
comment until the end of August.
s
lf e ider
Ha ic rov
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The leading global event
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Confirmed speakers include:
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Twitter UK
Topics this year include:
Vincent Martin
VP Business
Development
DailyMotion
Kate Bradshaw
Head of Digital
Scripps Networks
Daniel Danker
Chief Product Officer
Shazam
Spencer Stephens
EVP and CTO
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Entertainment
• The onset of multiple OTT platforms
• Device strategy for OTT players
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• Successful multiplatform monetization strategies
• Media asset management and its role in the OTT
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• Social TV and its impact on OTT strategies
• Social media networks
• Partnering with operators
• Original content as a route to monetization
• Trans media content strategies
Very thorough overview of current
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• Spreading outside your domestic market through OTT
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Jerome Kim, 3D Content Manager, LG Electronics UK
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TV Connect Global Events
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News
Ziggo begins nationwide WiFi rollout
news in brief
Twitter TV deals
Twitter is close to reaching a deal
with Viacom that would bring
high-quality TV clips and
advertising to the site. Twitter is
understood to have also held
discussions with NBCUniversal
about a content partnership. If
the partnerships with the
television networks go through,
Twitter would be able to stream
videos on its site and share the
advertising revenue with the
networks. Building on its existing
partnerships with ESPN, Weather
Channel LLC and Turner
Broadcasting System, Twitter is
seeking to add more
entertainment and news video
while a large chunk of active
users directly tweet about TV
programmes being watched.
PayPal on LG smart TVs
LG Electronics has become the
first connected TV manufacturer
to enable PayPal payments in its
products across multiple markets.
The feature is already available on
2013 LG Smart TVs in the US,
Canada and the UK, and will also
be included in models in France,
Germany, Spain, Italy and
Australia starting this month,
with other markets to follow.
New CEO for Shazam
Shazam has appointed Rich Riley
as its new chief executive officer.
Andrew Fisher, who has led the
company as CEO since 2005, has
been appointed to the newly
created position of executive
chairman. With Riley and Fisher
in their new positions, and the
recent hire of the BBC’s Daniel
Danker as chief product officer,
Shazam continues its shift from
music tagging into a global media
engagement firm. Shazam now
has more than 300m users in over
200 countries worldwide.
10
May-June 2013
Dutch cable operator Ziggo has
deployed 65,000 WiFi hot spots in
The Hague, the first part of a
country-wide rollout of the wireless
networking technology that will see
almost one million hot spots
activated by the end of August.
Following the test city of
Groningen, The Hague will be the
second location to go live, with
approximately 65,000 Ziggo
WifiSpots active by 7 May. After a
one-time registration, the
company’s internet clients will
automatically have access to all
available WifiSpots.
Ziggo is looking to replicate the
in-home experience to its customers
on the move, and a number of
European cable operators will
follow suit, if this year’s Cable
Congress conference is anything to
go by, which Cable Europe Labs is
also hoping to encourage with the
development of a set of standard
specs for cable WiFi deployments.
The company said it has adapted
its equipment and programmes so
that: there will be a total separation
between the WifiSpot and the client
network; Wi-Fi use by clients does
not affect their internet performance;
and that the WifiSpot has enough
range to provide 20 guest users
simultaneously with the necessary
freedom of movement.
Ziggo tested the system in
Groningen, saying that almost all
clients found it to be an excellent
alternative to 3G. Less than 1% of
the clients turned off the hotspot
function and did not wish to
participate, according to the
cablenet.
“We want our clients to be able to
use our products outside their homes
and on the move. Ziggo WifiSpots
provide the technical basis that
makes that possible. We are currently
working on several new services that
will be geared to the Ziggo WifiSpots
network,” said Pieter Vervoort, VP
consumer products & innovation at
Ziggo.
Liberty Global, meanwhile, has
raised its stake in Ziggo, leading to
talk of a possible takeover. Liberty,
which already owned 12.65% of the
Netherlands-based cablenet, raised its
stake to 15%.
Austria launches DVB-T2
Austrian Broadcasting Services
(ORS) is switching on a DVB-T2
based service to boost capacity for
high definition channels, the latest
European country to do so.
The new nationwide terrestrial
TV bouquet, called simpliTV,
launches in mid-April and will offer
40 TV channels. Customers will
need a CI Plus module from
Neotion, which uses Irdeto CA
media protection technology.
Austria completed analogue switch
off in 2011 and ORS is moving to
next-gen DVB-T2 service to improve
efficiency of its DTT network, mainly
greater capacity for HD channels, in
order to compete more effectively
with cable and satellite platforms.
Italy, Sweden, Finland, Denmark,
Germany and the UK are among the
countries that have already deployed
commercial T2 services.
A third of the initial 40 channels
will be available in high definition. It
includes FTA channels from public
broadcaster ORF along with
programmes from private
broadcasters RTL and
ProSiebenSat.1 i.e.
The service will be launched on 15
April on a subscription basis with a
EUR10 monthly fee.
Euro payTV stays resistant to
downturn
European private TV groups are
bucking the recession by achieving
overall growth despite a fall in GDP,
according to European Audiovisual
Observatory.
EAO data shows that despite
-0.3% negative growth of the EU’s
GDP in 2012, the 20 leading
private TV companies in Europe
achieved overall organic growth of
1.9%. Pay-TV providers such as Sky,
Vivendi and Prisa performed better
www.csimagazine.com
than ad-funded platforms, with an
overall organic growth rate of 3.7%,
compared to a fall of 1% for the latter.
In the free-to-air sector, growth
from the likes of ITV, The RTL
Group and Prosiebensat.1 Media
(mainly due to the success of
diversification activities such as
thematic channels and on-demand
services), has been offset by a “severe
decrease” of the TV advertising
market in Italy, Spain and Eastern
Europe, which has affected the
revenues of Mediaset (-12.5%),
Antena 3 (-7.9%), CME (-10.7%) and
TVN (-7.8&).
News
Gateway shipments to surge
Global shipments of multimedia home
gateways (MHGs) are expected to
skyrocket in the next few years as payTV operators seek to unify the
delivery of different forms of video
content to all types of devices in
homes.
Global MHG shipments are set to
climb to 9.6 million units in 2015
and 2016, up from just 90,000 in
2011, according to IHS Screen
Digest.
MHGs act as the bridge between
broadcast and IP video distribution,
allowing cable and satellite operators
to use the efficiency and quality of
broadcast television to provide
advanced services and content to all
kinds of IP-connectable devices,
including mobile and tablet devices.
The increasing integration of
Wi-Fi home networking within
MHGs underscores the commitment
of operators to support multiscreen
video in the home, believes IHS, with
Wi-Fi penetration in MHGs is
forecast to grow to 73% of units
news in brief
12,000
Global Multimedia Home Gateway Unit Shipment Forecast
(Thousands of Units)
10,000
8,000
6,000
4,000
2,000
0
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
Source: IHS Screen Digest March 2013
shipped by 2016, up from just 18%
in 2012.
Beyond the wireless networking
technology some of the major
services include gigabit broadband,
transcoding, large applications,
graphics processors, content storage
and edge caching, although the
hardware and software requirements
for each MHG are quite different
from one operator to the next,
making MHGs a profitable pointof-value creation for STB
manufacturers and their suppliers
for the foreseeable future.
Home automation and security,
as well as smart energy and
e-health services, all could be
supported by the MHG and offer
additional revenue opportunities, as
operators take control of the home
network.
18M DVB-T2 STBs in 2015
ABI Research expects over 18 million
DVB-T2 set-top boxes to ship in 2015,
assuming remaining analogue shutoff
timelines go largely as planned.
By the end of last year, North
America and Western Europe had
effectively made the transition to
DTT broadcasts, while a number
of countries in Eastern Europe and
Middle-East Africa are leapfrogging
to start directly with the newer more
advanced DVB-T2 standard.
Humax HD-Fox T2
Austria, Italy, Sweden, Finland,
Denmark, Germany and the UK
are among the countries that have
already deployed commercial
T2 services, with others such as
Turkey set to follow.
While most countries have
settled on a DTT technology, the
path to digital is less consistent
in other regions where multiple
DTT technologies are present and
future analogue shutoffs span a
wide timeframe (2015 to 2020s).
ABI sees integrated televisions
playing a role in digitisation, but
set-top boxes, by necessity, are still
the driver used to fully satisfy most
ASO goals. “After 2015 we do
expect demand for DTT set-top
boxes to decline, but circumstances
beyond ASOs could shift the outlook
higher,” the analysts said.
Other potential factors, like
spectrum reallocation for mobile
broadband in Western Europe
(currently the focus of much global
debate), might increase the
demand for DVB-T2 boxes,
but this likely won’t be a
significant factor until the
latter half, if not past the
2018 timeline, according to
the analysts.
75m IPTV subs globally
There are over 75 million IPTV
subscribers worldwide, after 3.6
million customers were added in
Q4 2012, according to Point
Topic. Percentage growth is
falling slightly at 4.97%,
compared to 5.04% in the
previous quarter. While China,
France and the US continue to
hold the top three spots in IPTV,
emerging markets are still seeing
strong percentage growth,
including 32% growth in Korea,
86% in Russia and the
Netherlands (45%). Some 11.8%
of all broadband subscribers now
take an IPTV service.
DTV to rocket in LatAm
Digital TV penetration in Latin
America will grow from less than
a third of homes at the end of
2012 to nearly 45% by the end of
this year, according to Digital TV
Research. Some 100m digital TV
households in the 19 countries
covered by the report will be
added between 2011 and 2018 to
take the total to 134m, when
penetration will exceed 80%.
Much of this growth is being
driven by satellite TV, especially
lower-cost and prepaid packages.
Brazil, Mexico and Argentina
dominate the region.
Set-top box IC market share
Broadcom and STMicro tied in
unit shipments for the worldwide
set-top box IC market in 2012,
with both delivering between 85
and 86m video SoCs for STBs,
according to ABI Research.
China’s Ali Technology came
third with 65m SoCs, having seen
significant growth within free-toair terrestrial boxes by Chinese
OEMs. Broadcom captures
significantly higher value design
wins in North American and
Western European cable and
satellite markets.
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
11
Analyst corner
Free to air: the new pay?
Pay TV channels are fighting to go to advertising supported
models, so which markets offer the best potential options?
L
ife can often be counter-intuitive,
and one of the key trends in the
multi-channel pay TV market
right now is just that: pay TV
channels are clamouring to go
free-to-air. They are doing it at a
time when the TV advertising
market remains under sustained pressure. So what
is going on? Is there something in the water in
Europe that makes straight-thinking US pay TV
channel groups decide that the free business model
is suddenly the way forward?
It all started in Spain. Back in 2005 Disney and
Sony inked content partnerships with terrestrial
license holders when the Spanish government,
realising that its self-imposed analogue switch-off
date was fast approaching, got its act together and
re-launched its failed pay DTT as a free platform.
Those partnerships became channels that mean,
today, the pay brand Disney Channel is free to
every household in the country and others have
since followed suit.
Free TV market potential 2012
80
70
Jump across the channel to the UK and similar
developments have been underfoot. Most notably,
Discovery launched its Quest channel on
Freeview, marking a significant foray into the
advertising-supported market for this high-end
channel group. And the latest development is in
Germany, where Disney recently announced that
it will try to replicate its success in Spain with the
launch of a new 24-hour kids channel as a free
service.
It’s not that the world of advertising sales is
new to these traditionally-pay TV groups. The
basic pay TV model relies on the dual revenue
stream of carriage income and advertising
revenue, and in mature markets, the income from
advertising — once local advertising sales are in
place — can approach parity with that derived
from carriage. But it is this dual revenue stream
that has served the pay channel industry so well
and been the envy of free-to-air channels when
times are tough. So why, in some of the biggest
TV markets in Europe, are pay groups throwing
some of their eggs in the free-to-air basket?
What’s particularly interesting about the latest
trend is that it is premium-end pay TV brands like
Discovery and Disney that are now moving to
free. What is it about a market that leads to the
decision to make this shift?
60
% TV homes
50
40
30
20
10
Belgium
Switzerland
Netherlands
Denmark
Portugal
Luxembourg
Norway
Sweden
France
Ireland
Finland
Germany
UK
Malta
Austria
Greece
Cyprus
Spain
Italy
0
Source: IHS Electronics & Media
12 May-June 2013
DTT
FREESAT
Factors to consider
There are three key factors to consider: firstly the
group must be confident that it can make the
move without damaging its key pay TV
relationships; secondly these developments often
(but not always) occur in markets where the pay
TV market is small. But the single most important
factor is the strength of the country’s free-to-air
platforms combined with the size of the
advertising market, meaning that even in markets
where there is a risk of damaging pay
relationships and where the pay TV market is not
small, it can still be worth taking the free plunge.
In Spain the choice is clear: the pay market is
tiny and (through the national reach and usage of
digital terrestrial) a free-to-air play gives access to
www.csimagazine.com
100 per cent of Spanish
households. The result is that
Spain now has four major
‘pay’ brands on its free
service: Disney Channel,
Paramount Channel, MTV and Discovery Max.
Germany works a little differently: the terrestrial
market is tiny, but premium pay TV is still small,
and while cable is highly penetrated, the most
important package on cable is the free access tier.
Free satellite (self installed) is also important. At
over €4bn, the German TV advertising market is
also large, making it a prime market for the new
planned Disney channel as well as supporting
other free pay brands like Nickelodeon and
Comedy Central. It seems likely that more will
follow.
The UK offers something of a conundrum. But
here, despite the huge importance of pay, the
success and reach of Freeview mean that taking a
measured punt on a free-to-air channel (as
Discovery has done) can still make sense.
So where else in Europe is there potential to
explore the free-to-air option? Analysing DTT
uptake and advertising market size it’s clear that
there are other markets where opportunity exists
and has yet to be widely exploited. The key
markets where free household potential is high
and the advertising pie large are Spain, Italy,
Germany and the UK, but France (despite a lower
free household potential) also looks like an
interesting market thanks to the €3.3bn potential
of its TV ad market. Italy looks a little underexploited by pay channel brands despite some
forays through partnerships by Viacom and
Turner. If free is the new pay, the big European
markets look set for plenty more activity yet.
Guy Bisson is research
director, television, at IHS
Screen Digest. In this regular
column, he gives CSI readers
exclusive insight from the
company’s new channel strategies service
RAI Amsterdam
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DOCSIS 3.1
Cable’s need for speed
The new iteration of Docsis standard will appear sooner than might have been
expected, promising higher data rates and a more efficient use of spectrum. Goran
Nastic looks at the likely evolution of D3.1 and what it means for cable’s future
C
able is once again opening
up its toolkit in order to fulfil
requirements of future
services and increasing
demand for more capacity.
Emerging Docsis 3.1
technology will allow MSOs
to deploy Gigabit services over existing HFC
networks and migrate to higher bandwidth based
on market requirements and also respond to the
challenge posed from the likes of Google Fiber
and telco FTTH deployments globally.
“If you follow current trends for offered
maximum speeds in the downstream and
upstream, we project that around 2016 that speed
will be 1Gbps downstream so we need a little bit
of lead time in order to be ready for that so we
would be foolish not to start 3.1 prior to this,”
said Cable Labs CTO Ralph Brown at Cable
Congress 2013, rationalising the industry’s
thinking. “We’re saying by 2016 we need to be
ready. We’re moving very aggressively and are on
a very tight schedule. We expect specifications to
be issued this year, products available next year
and deployment to be in 2015 and beyond.”
Cable has consistently been more rapid to
market in terms of development cycles compared
to other fixed and wireless standards, according to
Cable Labs figures, with the Docsis average
taking around four years. The timelines will be
even more aggressive with 3.1, the project having
only been incepted last year.
The OFDM revolution
D3.1 is cable’s next generation Physical Layer
14 May-June 2013
(PHY) technology, which primarily leverages two
key modern communication technologies, namely
Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing
(OFDM) and forward error correction (FEC)
from the Low Density Parity Check code (LDPC)
family. The combination provides increased
efficiency (up to 50% better in the downstream
and 66% better in the upstream) by enabling
higher order QAM modulations (up to
4096QAM) on the plant.
It also can operate over much wider channels
for increased peak data rates. It does the latter by
removing the 6MHz and 8MHz channel spacing
used so far, replacing them with smaller 20KHzto-50KHz-wide subcarriers that can then be
bonded together inside a spectrum block up to
200MHz wide.
While increased capacity is a major driver for
D3.1, there are some additional operational
benefits that operators will see, according to John
Ulm, Fellow of Technical Staff at Motorola
Mobility’s Home business (now part of Arris),
such as making the plant more resilient to new
interferers like LTE. “We are also looking at
putting in better energy management assists to
enable much lower power consumption in the
consumer devices,” he notes.
Greater intelligence and automation in plant
maintenance and monitoring is another side effect
but really OFDM is the star of the show.
“The interesting thing about OFDM is it
provides the ability to provide a more consistent
level of performance. Really you would get more
bandwidth for a given amount of spectrum. The
spectrum itself is gold, it’s hard to get spectrum,
www.csimagazine.com
there’s always lots to do with that spectrum and
you’ve got to make an important business
decision in how you use that spectrum,” says John
Chapman, engineering fellow and CTO of Cisco
System’s Cable Access Business Unit.
“3.1 is our road to full spectrum, we see a full
spectrum upstream and a full spectrum
downstream, so 1 or 2GB in the upstream and
10GB in the downstream – and that type of
bandwidth enables a very rich video over IP
experience for example. We can see the entire
plant migrating over to an IP infrastructure. It will
have to coexist with existing QAM offerings for
VoD and broadcast for a number of years, but the
operator will have a choice now as to where to
put their bits and on which transport,” he says.
OFDM was, in fact, proposed in the early days
of IEEE 802.14, which was the first attempt to
come up with a cable modem standard although it
failed due to too many competing proposals. On
the bright side, it led MSOs to form MCNS and
the birth of Docsis so in a sense the technology is
now making a long overdue comeback, having
established itself in wireless (WiFi and LTE),
satellite and terrestrial applications (DVB-S2 and
T2) that have created economies of scale.
Processing power in modern silicon has also
advanced sufficiently to make implementation
feasible and cost effective.
“OFDM is a very powerful piece, but also a
very complex issue and today we are at a stage
where it’s appropriate for cable. We are convinced
it’s the right way to go for 3.1, it’s a revolutionary
approach,” Christoph Schaaf, head of new
technologies at Kabel Deutschland, said at the
DOCSIS 3.1
Cable Congress. “What’s new with C-OFDM
based solutions is we are getting close to the
theoretical Shannon limit,” he added.
Migration strategies
With such a bullish roadmap, how can MSOs best
prepare for D3.1? The backwards compatibility
and flexibility that Docsis provides – even more
so with 3.1 – gives MSOs a lot of options in terms
of how they deploy this technology and the timing
of various components, according to Brown at
Cable Labs.
Nevertheless, it is expected that the CPE
migration will occur first due silicon availability
and that downstream will initially drive
deployments (see chart, opposite). Not only is
there still a lot of legacy Docsis 2.0 CMTS and
cable modems still out there, there is even some
older 1.0 and 1.1 equipment there too that needs
removing. There are no more D2 modems being
sold in the European market but it’s not clear how
many customers have D3-capable CPE.
To support backward compatibility there is a
requirement to support up to 32 Single Carrier
QAM channels as part of any D3.1 SoC solution.
This allows not only backward compatibility but
also provides a simple transition from D3.0
through D3.1 ready deployment of CPE (running
still in D3.0 mode right up to 1Gbs or 24-32
channel bonding on D3.0) and then allowing
those devices to switch over to using D3.1 OFDM
channels, according to Charles Cheevers,
customer premises solutions CTO at Arris, which
is working with its silicon partners to develop the
first D3.1 CPE devices, most likely in home
gateways, but is also involved on the CCAP side.
“The one big bang for the buck would be to
start the frequency migration at the plant,” argues
Cisco’s Chapman. “My recommendation would
be to start migrating to an 85MHZ plant rate now
and then all new modems that can support
85MHZ, whether Docsis 3.0 or 3.1 can then be
sorted into that bandwidth.”
Help is also at hand from the US-based SCTE
standards group, which is in parallel to the spec
development developing training courses and
already working with field technicians and the
operations side to make sure this aspect of
deployment is ready. This involves new
modulation technology to understand and get
used to, how the cable plant is impacted and
other factors. Daniel Howard, SVP of engineering
and CTO at SCTE, urges MSOs to prepare their
networks ahead of time using recommended
practices from the organisation, which has a
special working group that is developing a
document called ‘HFC Plant Readiness for
DOCSIS 3.1’.
Howard further believes D3.1 represents an
evolution not a revolution; “It will actually be
easier because a lot of the issues that we ran into
deploying 3.0 were issues that we would have run
into when we did 3.1. A lot of the hard work in
terms of getting the plant itself ready was done
for 3.0 so it’s really just a matter of leveraging
that. It’s very instructive to note that it’s 3.1, not
4.0,” he says.
Cable FTTH? No so fast...
The point here is that cable’s flexibility gives it a
vast amount of tools at its disposal without
needing to invest in costly FTTH solutions any
time soon with the possible exception of
Greenfield or new-build sites. Indeed, it is even
questionable whether cable will have to go allfibre at all, even though FTTH is widely regarded
as the most future-proof access technology.
On average, cable architecture serves around
500 homes passed per node and operators are
still working their networks down to 256 or 125
homes per service group - with some going as low
as 100 or 50 under a ‘fibre deep’ architecture - to
meet downstream demands (upstream needs
being a matter of some debate). The closer
operators get to the home, the higher the costs
are, whereas cable’s distinction has historically
been the ability to do incremental upgrades,
an adaptability that has put it in good stead
for the last few decades as competition has
become more intense. Thanks to D3 technology,
cable now offers average customer broadband
speeds of 32Mbps in Europe (30-50Mbps is seen
as the marketing sweetspot).
“We view D3.1 to be a long term capacity
management tool at cable’s disposal as opposed
to a near term capacity management approach
such as node splits, analogue reclamation and
SDV,” says Ulm. Motorola’s capacity modelling,
based on continued aggressive video and data
growth scenarios, has shown that there is plenty
of life left in HFC, and certainly more than ten
years. “We do not see a cliff emerging where
operators will have no choice but to go to FTTP,”
suggests Ulm. In fact, he points out that FTTP is
a complimentary aspect of the company’s HFC
portfolio and operators can deliver this through
node platforms today.
“Personally, I think that cable will always have
a choice. Cable operators will be competitive with
the telcos for a long time and always have that
advantage that they have a choice as opposed to
being forced to go one way or another,” agrees
Cisco’s Chapman.
For Cheevers at Arris, the same logic applies.
“It’s ironic that when you look at the Node+0
architecture of HFC as the endgame – where you
have moved fibre as deep as possible, and
preserve the last 100ft of coax - the available
capacity for 250-128 homes connected allows for
all the video and ultra HD content any home can
consume. So if you assume that someday the
DVB QAM linear content goes away in preference
for an all IP delivery over OFDM D3.1 capacity
then we have so much additional capacity to use
we can offer new real-time networking experiences
to our customers.”
So, Docsis 4.0 anyone?
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
15
Conference review
This year’s Cable Congress marked yet further proof that
cable is evolving from TV towards broadband infrastructure.
Goran Nastic reports
Broadband and TV:
a tale of two cables
I
n Europe at least, it is increasingly clear
that the cable industry’s strategic focus has
shifted to broadband, a message reinforced
at this year’s Cable Congress in London,
an annual gathering of the industry’s great
and the good which attracts around 750 or
so delegates every year. Around 20% of the
region’s broadband homes are connected via cable,
which creates a large opportunity to play for and
one that MSOs are aggressively looking to
penetrate further, mainly in the residential market
but also the largely untapped business segment.
The stall was set from the show’s opening press
conference, where the message was one of a telcoand network-centric future. “The industry is at a
major crossroads of technology and content. The
narrative of the cable industry is changing from a
fundamentally TV business to a telecoms service
industry,” said Cable Europe president Manuel
Kohnstamm, perhaps prescient of a long-term
16
May-June 2013
future where TV delivery becomes internet based.
Cable Europe data showed growth in
broadband and telephony services but a decline in
the overall cable TV (CATV) subscriber base as
competitive pressure – and perhaps a
consequence of this change of narrative - takes
their toll.
Official figures compiled for the industry group
by IHS Screen Digest showed broadband revenues
increasing 6.5% on the back of subscriber growth
of 8.4% to just over 27 million broadband
customers. Together with a healthy growth in
telephony the two now reached almost half of all
cable industry revenues at the end of 2012, a big
change from a decade earlier when TV ruled the
roost.
It also shows that cable’s aggressive investment
in broadband infrastructure, especially Docsis 3
technology, is paying off. Cable operators now
offer average customer broadband speeds of
www.csimagazine.com
32Mbps in Europe (30-50 is seen as the marketing
sweetspot), which is a greater headline rate than
DSL across Europe. To further boost
competitiveness, MSOs are now also aggressively
pursuing even faster speeds with the Docsis 3.1
standard (see page 14), which will allow cable to
deploy Gigabit services over existing HFC
networks and migrate to higher bandwidth
services based on market demand while making
more efficent use of spectrum.
Cable has long prided itself on the number of
tools it has in its toolbox without needing to
invest in costly FTTH infrastructure and it is this
flexibility that insiders believe give it an advantage
over competitors.
On the other hand, it was also revealed that the
total number of European CATV keeps falling as
users switch to IPTV (and OTT) platforms, while
DTT and satellite remain robust.
What about TV?
So where does all this leave cable television? TV
services seem to be seen by the industry as merely
a way of adding to the value in terms of multiservice offerings. Premium and exclusive content,
moreover, has been traded off to deliver
everything in a more agnostic way.
Conference review
During a Q&A session on the first day of the
conference, Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries was
asked what plans the cablenet had in terms of
sports and other content, in light of the company
becoming the world’s largest cable operator once
its acquisition of Virgin Media closes at the end
of May. His response was telling; “Our philosophy
historically has been that we’re in the business for
open access not exclusive for content. I don’t see
us competing with Sky for sports content or
football rights in an aggressive way across most of
our markets. It’s also not in our strategic plan to
start investing massive amounts of capital in
content providers. Content will flow to the best
platforms and it will flow to consumers through
those platforms and it will end up on their TV
sets,” said Fries.
Some analysts believe this unwillingness to
match satellite in terms of content or indeed
rolling out new TV related technologies might
cost cable dear in the long-term.
“The cable industry is caught in a pincer
movement between higher value, technologyleading satellite services, and free DTT services,”
wrote Strategy Analytics analyst David Mercer in
his blog, noting that cable’s real strength lies in
broadband.
Predominantly, it was competition from telcos
that contributed the main talking points. The
following comments made by various MSO
executives paint a good picture:
• “Having gone through the heavy lifting of
investing in core networks, cable is now
ready to reap the rewards.”
• “Cable’s strength is the changing nature of
Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries interviewed on stage
about acquisitions and cable’s future direction
“Superfast broadband
is as important as
canals and railways
were in the past.
Digital services are
the new arteries for
our economies.”
broadband, that’s been our ‘hero product’.”
• “We have Gigabit capability coming to a
Docsis network near you soon.”
• “We are investing 26% of our revenues in
CapEx every year and most of it is on fibre.”
To this end, the message was also that
cablenets should get more cosy with national
governments to ease regulatory burdens against
the might of telco incumbents.
Of course, television still matters – which
explains Liberty’s investment in Horizon, Virgin’s
progress under TiVo and Zon underlining the
importance of its ‘Iris’ UI - to the vast majority of
customers, so cable must deliver to those
expectations in one way or another.
“As connected home technologies converge the
opportunity to build on cable’s broadband
strengths will increase, but content rights battles,
the key competitive challenge, are here to stay,”
added Mercer.
Back to the ‘dumb pipe’?
As Fitch Ratings agency highlighted in a recent
research note: “Cable operator’s revenue and
EBITDA growth has been increasingly reliant on
high-speed data products. In contrast, their legacy
video services continue to experience negative
pressure in revenue and margins. Ultimately a
growing consumption of data will lead to
measured data service for cable connections. This
scenario could drive cable operators to focus
solely on growing data usage on their connections
The official Cable Congress party, held at the London
Film Museum, with local beats and vibes
to customers through owned and third-party
applications even at the expense of their own
retail video services.”
Cable Europe’s new executive chairman,
Matthias Kurth, was right when he noted: “It is
clear from Cable Congress this year, that the
future has much to offer, but one thing is for
certain – we must keep the pressure on, keep
innovating, and keep the customer at the forefront
of everything we do.”
So for all the bullish enthusiasm on display
over the three day event (and to be sure, the cable
industry has much to be proud of in terms of how
it has reacted to new challenges and continually
reinvented itself), this should serve as a warning
against any complacency.
But operators are stuck between a decision of
being innovators, and those that see the value of
simply being a ‘dumb pipe’ given competition
from OTT, high content costs and thinning
margins (an estimated 70% of an operator’s CPE
costs are tied to the STB). As Parks Associates
put it, should MSOs extend through value-added
services, or refocus on their core provision of
bandwidth capacity? The answer is still very much
up for debate.
Cable Congress 2014, likely to be held in
Brussels as the EU capital becomes the event’s
semi-permanent home, will be a good marker as
to whether cable’s strategy of open access to
content through superior networks continues to
pay off or whether it shows that a change in
thinking is required.
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
17
Second-screen synchronisation
The year of the second
screen app
With significant growth predicted for apps linking
second screen interactivity to TV viewing, synchronisation
technology will see a similar commercial expansion. All it
needs is one killer app, writes Adrian Pennington
I
f 2012 was the year of the second screen,
then by most accounts 2013 will be the
year of the second screen app.
Broadcasters, content owners and brands
are looking for ways to engage multitasking viewers with content and
advertising properly aligned to what’s being
shown on the first screen.
According to Intrasonics CEO Luc Jonker,
“We’ve seen the first green shoots in the secondscreen apps space and we know that we’re right at
the start of what will become a whole new market
area, not just for broadcast TV, but for radio and
cinema as well.”
The company’s clients include Belgium’s
Fastest Quiz in the World and Spain’s MTV Xtra/
Gandia Shore, the latter serving 500,000 pieces of
exclusive content each episode.
Automatic content recognition (ACR)
technology lives within a broader context of
second screen TV engagement, the market for
which is rapidly on the rise. “Within this context,
ACR plays an important enabling role in reducing
the effort required of users to engage and as a
means of measuring engagement,” says Steve
Plunkett, CTO at Red Bee Media.
KDDI UI on iOS
18 May-June 2013
The technology is in an experimental phase but
most observers expect to see considerable uptake
over the next 12 months. Jay Friedman VP,
marketing and client services, Audible Magic is
among them. He believes the ‘killer app’ is yet to
be found – but when it does it might just explode
the market.
“We’re beginning to see some really good social
engagement numbers but discussion of
monetisation opportunities is possibly premature,”
he says. “We see some success promoting the sale
of merchandising during a show as a way to add
value but nobody is going to get rich on that
alone.”
In the North American market, broadcasters
seem to be ahead in adopting ACR technology,
followed by content owners, especially for
applications to synchronise apps to broadcast
content, says Friedman, where Audible Magic is
working with networks including FOX, CBS,
Univision, CBC, A&E and Discovery. The
company as recently awarded six technology
patents for its recent innovations in digital
fingerprinting, content recognition and related
technologies, including ACR technology that
automatically identifies TV advertising.
“Broadcasters seem to have the strongest
incentive to increase viewer engagement
and ultimately see improved GRPs (Gross
Rating Points) as measured by Nielsen,” he
says. “Movie production companies see
ACR as a way of adding more value to
DVD and Blu-ray releases to increase sales.
While we see activity among service
providers, they seem to be lagging behind
these others because they have other ways
of understanding what viewers are
watching.”
The most common companion
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experiences in the UK to date
have been around show
formats – talent shows or
quizzes - such as the BBC’s
inaugural second screen app
for The Antiques Roadshow
(with ACR devised by
Intrasonics) – but here too broadcasters are
adopting ACR.
NBC Universal-owned Syfy is the first domestic
broadcaster to launch a channel-wide secondscreen app, after the success of the original in the
US which has been downloaded 200,000 times
since August 2012 in support of series including
Being Human.
“There is clear interest among broadcasters
who have noted the success of format specific
apps and would like to now drive engagement
around all of their programming, and channels,
and to do theoretically as often as people are
viewing TV,” asserts Civolution CEO Alex
Terpstra. French media group Lagardère Active,
for example, is using Civolution’s synchronisation
technology to drive second screening around its
family channel Gulli.
“If you are developing a TV format or series
without any notion of second screen you are
already in a danger zone,” argues Terpstra. “You
cannot afford not to address the opportunities
that already exist.”
Zeebox, the second screen app which has been
downloaded over four million times since launch
with investment from broadcasters in the UK
[Sky], US [Comcast, NBC Universal] and
Australia [Network 10], says content teams are
exploring ways to enhance shows in Zeebox.
“If you want to pitch a new commission to Sky
you need a second screen proposition around it or
be sent back to come up with something,” reports
founder Anthony Rose.
Until now Zeebox has been tied to the linear
EPG but is introducing an ACR service in tandem
with Gracenote that will allow it to detect which
show a user is watching and serve up relevant
social media and Zeeetags produced at the time
of broadcast. The update, trialled in the US first,
Second-screen synchronisation
will enable it to support any show aired in the
past seven days.
Is engagement working?
Ensequence, which builds interactive software
and services for US networks, has been working
with ACR for about 18 months and has found “a
lot of excitement but no clear strategy in
particular around monetisation,” reports Aslam
Khader, the company’s CTO. “It was an
experiment then, and that is largely still the case.
More worryingly, he says, “It’s been a bit of
a disappointment no matter what parameter you
choose to measure - from level of engagement to
number of users or time spent in the apps.”
He attributes this to some fundamental flaws
in the consumer experience, namely having to
download a number of apps, or having to invoke
and launch an app while watching a show.
“Unless there’s a really compelling reason to do
so and heavy on-air promotion or unless you are
a die-hard fan then the barrier to experience is
too high,” he says. “The industry needs another
12 months for clarity in terms of the forms
that work.”
Nor is he alone in sounding an early warning.
Gareth Capon, product development director at
BSkyB, provided a rationale in the broadcaster’s
investment in Zeebox: “It’s a challenge to ask
customers to use lots of different apps or devices
to move through them and remember what they
are. We need to simplify things and offer a
singular, cross platform experience.”
Michael Woodley, business development
consultant, Intrasonics adds, “It’s important not
to roll out the second-screen experience too
quickly, especially advertising. It needs to start by
educating and informing. We will put audiences
off if we throw in too much ads too soon.”
A fresh study by NPD Group in the US found
that while multitasking is common, viewers are
less willing to use their second devices to interact
directly with applications designed specifically for
the TV programmes they are watching. Those that
did, interacted most by visiting IMDb, Wikipedia,
and social networks (see chart, above).
“Viewers are interested in searching to find
further information about TV shows they are
watching, but they are not using games and other
immersive applications created as a component of
the programming,” said analyst Russ Crupnick.
“This situation creates a potential diversion from
advertising, and it will take a combined effort
What activities did you do on each device while you
were watching TV shows or movies on a television
Learned about actor/actress
Learned about show/movie
shopped for product in ad
Discovered new content
Used guide features
Discussed show on SNS
Learned abour athlete
Played game about show
Watched prevfiews/Clips
Voted for something on show
Followed stream of comments
Found popular shows
Checked in
Launched show
Source: NPD Group
None of the above
from content owners, advertisers, broadcasters,
and others to present an aligned second-screen
experience that will appeal to viewers.”
Tom Cape, who runs app developer Capablue,
notes: “People will start at programme level
because it’s easy to bite off. Once you’ve built
up a portfolio of these you can start to aggregate
this into a channel-wide app, then a top-level
app across multiple channels. My fear is that if
you try to go straight to a bigger cross-channel
app too soon, you end up doing an EPG with
some programme information which is not
that interesting.”
Advertising potential
The second screen’s advantage over TV in
interactivity theoretically means that advertisers
can better convert sales through direct calls to
action and initiatives like product placement.
There have been a rash of solutions designed to
show users targeted ads simultaneously with
specific TV programmes and commercials.
The first US campaign for Zeebox SpotSynch
was trialled during the 2013 Super Bowl in which
second screens showed a display ad for Fast &
Furious 6 simultaneously with the trailer
broadcast during the half-time break. Zeebox
stresses that broadcasters and ad agencies do not
need to change the way they produce or manage
TV advertising, as the app will detect broadcast
spot ads (across all broadcast networks and 120
cable channels) automatically.
Civolution has tied its similar server-side
content-triggering solution SyncNow with that of
US-based ad-management and distribution
platform DG. Audible Magic’s SmartID and
SmartSync platform is optimised to recognise and
create interactive advertising experiences.
Capablue, meanwhile, has trialled a proof of
concept using automatic watermarking technology
to sync ads with Channel 4’s linear output.
“We see it as second-screen engagement rather
than advertising,” says Cape. “It’s more about
relations and click-throughs and the direct
connection of seeing something through to
purchase. The audience is smaller but the brand
engagement is higher.”
ACR is likely to be incorporated into
transactional tracking applications, believes
Woodley at Intrasonics : “What interests me is the
ability to pinpoint exactly the adverts viewers are
interacting with - on a certain channel, certain
day, certain time – and to track that through to an
actual purchase which could be a month later.”
Synchronisation technologies
There are three main ACR techniques:
Network (or IP based) sync. Uses a data
connection from the app to a network server to
tell the app the precise time at the broadcaster. It
is then possible to calculate which show someone
is watching and where they are in its timeline.
“Time and metadata-based IP syncing can be
more cost effective and work across a broader
range of devices but are most suited to live
television rather than catch-up or recorded
content,” says Red Bee’s Plunkett.
“You have to assume that the viewer is
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
19
Second-screen synchronisation
watching the correct channel while running the
app, and that they are doing so live and not on a
PVR,” Woodley points out. “This technique does
not fully overcome the variable broadcast delay so
cannot offer pinpoint precise timing.”
Audio Fingerprint Matching. Captures a sample
of audio from a TV show being watched and
sends it to matching servers where it is compared
with a library of audio patterns to ID the content.
According to Woodley, “Setting up the library
of patterns is a significant effort and it is
expensive to maintain on a rolling basis. This
technique is good at identifying a show but not
capable of precise time synchronisation.”
On the plus side, digital fingerprinting allows
identification of content without having to modify
the content upfront.
Based on a patented digital fingerprint
algorithm, Audible Magic’s solutions are unique,
claims Friedman. “Our solutions easily scale both
horizontally and vertically as demonstrated by a
number of our customer deployments. We also
understand how to make a solution work for our
customers, with the fewest headaches - something
many other companies don’t understand.”
Audible Magic’s technology drives the
American Idol app, which synchronises bio
information, trivia, lyrics, where to buy songs,
and voting. It also has a deal with SlingMedia
where Audible’s ACR solutions will be embedded
into SlingBoxes.
Audio Watermark Detection. Performed by the
likes of Civolution and Intrasonics, watermarks
are inserted into pre-recorded content using
software, or into broadcast streams at playout
using real-time encoding hardware.
“We insert sequences of artificial echoes by
“We see some success
promoting the sale of
merchandising during
a show as a way to
add value but nobody
is going to get rich on
that alone.”
20
May-June 2013
Game of Thrones on iPad
modulating the audio,” explains Woodley. “Mics
on smartphones and tablets pick them up and any
app that uses our watermark decoders can
translate these short echo sequences into binary
data. This triggers an action: downloading a video,
opening an image, whatever it has been
programmed to do.
“Watermarking is ideal for precisely synced
playout and also works for time-shift and PVR
viewing. There is no need for a data connection
and when used for time sync in a gameshow
playalong, the timing is absolutely precise.”
New software from Intrasonics, called
Heartbeat, will automatically insert watermark
codes at regular intervals throughout the
programme, where previously clients had to
choose which points they wanted them to appear.
“Heartbeat is a world first and will enable
broadcasters to take control of second screen by
easily, constantly and automatically audio
watermarking entire broadcasts,” said Jonkers.
ACR limitations
Each of the ACR technologies present some
limitations. Audio approaches can suffer from
performance problems due to TV volume levels,
ambient noise, audio conditions within the
programming, microphone placement in the
second device, availability of microphone APIs
and so on.
“Audio watermarking requires access to the
source material and fingerprinting requires the
creation, management and publication of audio
libraries. IP based solutions have difficulties with
accurate synchronisation across different TV
transmission platforms,” assesses Plunkett. “It is
essential that these limitations are properly
understood before choosing an appropriate ACR
technology for a given application,” he advises.
www.csimagazine.com
Intrasonics sees a fragmented landscape with
different parties trying different things, and all
doing so with different agendas. “This is perfectly
normal and occurs whenever multiple new
technologies emerge at roughly the same time to
meet a demand that no on previously knew
existed,” reckons Jonker.
There may be moves to standardise ACR
technologies to broaden adoption, though the risk
at this stage is to stifle innovation.
“There is value of standardisation but when
you look at the failures around adoption of other
standards like BDLive and DLNA, the market has
to be careful of standardisation for the wrong
reasons,” says Friedman.
Adds Plunkett: “It would be good to have a
common mechanism based on standards but we
are probably too early in the innovation cycle for
this to make sense yet. We need to continue
experimenting with different technological
approaches before we can try to agree on a best
approach. I think we will see more advances
outside of audio synching. I also anticipate the
cost-per-show pricing to go down dramatically if
ACR solutions are to see widespread deployment.
Friedman suggests that just now everybody in
the industry is playing nicely and working
together; “When money starts to be made,
the gloves will come off and the real battles
will begin.”
Citizens of Florence app
Starz’s companion iPad app for its new show
Da Vinci’s Demons: Citizens of Florence
dynamically unlocks interactive content in
real-time as the show is being broadcast. The
same content will be available for viewers to
download and use any time after they watch
the show. The network said it has created
enough second-screen content that it will be
able to keep viewers of the series engaged
long after the series ends its initial run.
Different characters will have different
access to different “artifacts” within the
app’s representation of Florence. Additional
content includes videos, 360-degree views of
da Vinci’s inventions, locations to explore
and mini games.
The app works with sound sync
technology provided by German company
Mufin, the first time the technology has
been applied in the US. Stored in the app
are audio fingerprints, which the device app
listens to and when it detects an audio
sequence that matches one of the stored
fingerprints, that’s a trigger for the app to
unlock an associated feature.
OTT QoS
OTT and the QoS
conundrum
Managing Quality of Service in an OTT environment
requires a radically different approach to traditional
managed TV distribution. Stephen Cousins discusses the
many technical challenges and available solutions
A
s media companies,
including traditional
payTV operators, stake
their claim on the
burgeoning over-the-top
(OTT) services market,
so a corresponding need
has emerged for robust and reliable solutions to
help them guarantee quality of service (QoS).
The internet is, by definition, an unmanaged
network involving frequent fluctuations in
bandwidth that can cause latency and video jitter
and potentially compromising the viewing
experience, especially during live programming.
From a technical point of view, the transition
into OTT means understanding a range of new
technologies that differ greatly from traditional
methods of TV distribution, including internet
streaming protocols, content encoding quality and
CDN integration, buffering, profile selection
methods, DRM, media player quality, and more.
These can all have an impact on QoS, but by
selecting the most appropriate test, diagnostic or
network management tools, service providers can
adapt bit-rates and resolutions and possibly
restrict available content to guarantee customers’
quality of experience (QoE).
A properly designed QoS solution should help
them offer premium multi-screen and TV
Everywhere-type services with the same quality
available on existing satellite, cable and managed
IPTV platforms, whilst taking into account the
specific configurations of content, profiles,
networks and viewing devices.
Many operators are now experimenting with a
range of QoS systems at different stages of
delivery networks explains John Maguire, director
of product strategy at S3 Group: “We are seeing a
significant effort being made to include test and
22 May-June 2013
diagnostic capability throughout their platform
architecture. The increasing usage of mobile
devices is pushing many towards embedding
software diagnostics into applications used by
their customers. And we are seeing a greater focus
on increasing the manageability of home gateway
devices, perhaps the last device truly under the
service providers’ control,” he says.
Adopting the right approach is crucial as many
end users will not care what technology is being
used to deliver their viewing as long as the audio/
video they receive meets their quality
expectations. An inconsistent experience across
devices could cause them to seek out an
alternative provider.
Back to basics
In the digital TV realm, faulty reception is
typically all about losing signal, synchronisation,
or packets of data, caused by factors such as
signal degradation over the network due to multipath fading, packet drop due to channel
www.csimagazine.com
congestion, corrupted packets
rejected in-transit, or faulty
networking hardware.
In contrast, data
communicated over the
internet is sent using the more
reliable HTTP/TCP
transmission method, which doesn’t permanently
lose packets. Instead, if a packet is lost, a
retransmission request is made and it is resent. So
in this arena quality problems are caused more by
the time and bandwidth lost by having to resend
data, and this requires a new toolset for QoS.
The unstable bandwidth associated with OTT
can cause unwanted buffering, long start-up times,
video/audio stuttering and poor video quality on
full screen view. This can pose a particular
challenge during peak viewing times, says Jon
Haley, VP of product marketing & business
development at Edgeware: “The vast majority of
connected devices only support unicast, ie each
device requires an individual stream, even for live
TV consumption in the home, which can generate
huge traffic spikes.”
As unicast traffic levels grow, bottlenecks are
likely to be created in core and aggregation
networks. For network operators these can be
dealt with through capital-intensive router and
switch upgrades with the associated long lead
Streaming performance is impacted
by many factors. Source: Netflix
OTT QoS
times. However, stress on networks can be
relieved in a more cost effective and rapid way
through the use of highly efficient caching and
delivery servers, such as CDNs, located at the
edge of networks.
Adaptive bit rate streaming (ABR) is another
hugely important technology that ensures that the
quality of video content matches bandwidth
availability by leveraging the ubiquitous HTTP
protocol to detect the client’s bandwidth and
device resources in real time and adjusting the
quality of the video stream, in terms of data
fragments, accordingly. ABR is designed to ensure
that the viewing experience is maximised on both
high-end and low-end connections, reducing
buffering and start-up times.
The cache-based CDN approach sees providers
encode and store many different versions of every
piece of ABR content on caching servers to
ensure playback on any device utilising various
adaptive streaming protocols such as Apple HLS,
Adobe HDS, and Microsoft Smooth Streaming.
“The elegance of adaptive streaming is its
ability to seamlessly deliver a high QoE and it is
the reason that professional grade video delivery
has been able to go mainstream to IP connected
devices,” says Keith Wymbs, VP of marketing at
Elemental Technologies.
Codec vendors are currently working on
delivering better video quality at much lower
bitrates. For example, the HEVC compression
standard requires fewer bits to deliver the same
level of quality.
No magic bullet
However, ABR will not provide service providers
with a one stop solution to QoS, especially when
it comes to payTV where subscribers expect the
highest levels of video quality.
By understanding where the bottlenecks in
networks reside, whether at the head end, the
consumer end or somewhere in between, service
providers can prioritise quality optimisation
accordingly. There are several analytics software
vendors in the market, including Agama, Conviva,
Akamai and Comscore that offer real-time
monitoring and troubleshooting in these areas.
Conviva gathers real time network data to
determine whether a quality issue is local to a
viewer or if there is a problem within the wider
distribution system. Its Precision Video system
then selects a corrective action to optimise every
video stream and improve picture quality. The
system works by directing video traffic between
multiple CDNs to select the best quality stream.
Meanwhile, Agama’s OTT Analyzer quality
assurance probe includes continuous 24/7
monitoring as well as testing and troubleshooting
applications, and can analyse both Microsoft
Smooth Streaming and Apple HTTP Live
Streaming services in any combination. It
provides timeline analytics of both QoE and QoS
to help service providers understand relevant
technical quality parameters and how they affect
the viewing experience.
“The two delivery chain extremities [the head
end and customer end] are the main sources of
information when monitoring QoS,” says Mikael
Dahlgren, CEO at Agama Technologies. “The
head-end, where services are created, modified
and bundled, continues to play a central role in
service quality assurance, as problems arising here
have the potential to effect all viewers. Monitoring
the head end cannot be done with traditional
network-oriented monitoring approaches and it
requires dedicated OTT-HE monitoring and
analysis that covers the full OTT service stack
including the IP layer through to HTTP, manifest
and actual video and audio streams,” he says.
Edgeware’s Haley adds: “Solutions exist for
service providers to monitor the quality of the
video received on their STBs and via their apps
running on connected TVs, tablets, etc. However
when an issue arises, rapid interrogation of the
output of the head-end encoders and the video
delivery network is needed.”
Player/device-located service quality monitoring
is widely available and firms like OTT TV
platform Tvinci are able to collect quality
information from end devices to give operators
increased visibility as well as tools to improve the
overall service quality.
“We have an emphasis on paid for OTT
content, so QoS is something we take very
seriously,” says Vidan Lamdan, CTO and VP
Research & Development, Tvinci. “Our MediaHub
is very robust and able to feedback to our
customers to let them know exactly what kind of
quality of service their end users are actually
receiving, so they can select the right service from
the ISPs,” he says.
But testing individual devices to determine QoS
is not always sufficient, as customers often use
multiple devices simultaneously in the home and
the streaming of content to one device may
interrupt the OTT viewing experience on another
Sky Now TV not ready for primetime
Sky’s over-the-top TV service has suffered
multiple problems since launch, and judging
from a recent experience of a live football
match, they are yet to be resolved.
Now TV, which has amassed over 25,000
subscribers since launch last year, has seen
multiple complaints of the service failing
across a variety of devices, as a look at many
community chat boards reveals. There are also
reports that users of other Now TV channels
(ie movies) are seeing a deterioration in
service.
Now it seems that the company’s offer of
5,000 free day passes (normal price £9.99) as
a promotional tool has also backfired, with
one analyst calling a football game between
Manchester united and Manchester City as a
“major publicity disaster” for the service. In
this case, it was problems specific to the Xbox
app on which the service is available.
“This fiasco is confirmation that OTT TV is
a long way from prime time when it comes to
live sports, which was always going to be the
most challenging genre, even when major
powerhouses like BSkyB are behind it,”
commented David Mercer, an analyst with
Stategy Analytics.
According to Sky, the issue was not thrown
up in testing, which explains why it was only
caught in a live environment.
It would appear that BSkyB is unconcerned
about capacity issues, suggesting that the
technical issue lies elsewhere. The core
infrastructure of Now TV is shared with Sky
Go, which recently supported more than
330,000 concurrent users for the Real MadridManchester United game.
device. Devices also interact with second screen
interactive applications.
“In the last couple of years we have seen a
significant increase in interest in test automation
for service validation of inter-device interaction
right across our customer base,” said S3 Group’s
Maguire. Consequently the company has
expanded its StormTest platform to support CPE
such as Xboxes, PS3s, Blu-ray players, CTVs and
more in addition to traditional STBs.
Despite the many challenges, video over the
internet has serious potential and some service
providers have even started developing apps that
allow users to receive linear programmes on
connected devices. This leads many to believe that
OTT is now ready for a prime time audience.
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
23
Guest column
Innovating for the future of
UK television
The DTG gives more insight into the role and significance of
the FITT Taskforce
I
n September 2012, the Digital TV Group
(DTG), the industry association for digital
TV in the UK, together with the Minister
for Culture, Communications and Creative
Industries, Ed Vaizey MP, launched the
Future of Innovation in Television
Technology (FITT) Taskforce.
Led by a group consisting of senior content
executives, consumer specialists, technology
leaders, mobile and network providers and leading
academics in the field, the Taskforce’s aim is to
define the measures that should be implemented
to leverage the UK’s track record of innovation
within television technology. Ultimately, the
Taskforce strives to deliver sustainable UK
economic growth through facilitating innovation.
The DTG brings together the industry to enable
the successful delivery and evolution of digital TV
and associated technologies and therefore is best
placed to provide support to the FITT Taskforce.
The UK has a demonstrable track record of
innovating in television technology, creating better
and more effective products, processes, services,
technologies and ideas that are readily available to
markets, government and society. Examples
stretch from Baird’s experiments in mechanical
television, through to Ceefax and modern day
technologies such as Red Button, iPlayer, Sky Go,
Virgin Media, Freesat, Freeview and YouView.
The UK’s thriving and dynamic digital television
industry includes world-class delivery networks
provided by BT and Arqiva as well as the world’s
largest set-top box company Pace.
Historically, the UK creative industries have
been at the heart of innovation with London’s
West End, Soho, St. James and Mayfair having
the highest concentration of creative businesses
in the UK, and one of the highest in the world.
However, the continued success of the UK digital
television sector cannot be taken for granted.
Global competitive forces are driving some of the
industry’s major companies to invest their R&D
spending within their home countries or countries
where they can work with high-quality talent at
lower costs, rather than in the UK.
Furthermore, the technology standards
developed over time within and for the UK are
now being debated and developed at European
and world level. The FITT Taskforce will explore
how the current developments in technology can
be harnessed, to ensure the UK retains its
leadership position in audio-visual technology,
between now and 2025.
Four streams
The Taskforce is structured into four workstreams:
Computing for the Creative Industries, Future
Networks and Infrastructure, Evolution of
Devices and Applications, Consumer Trends
over the Next Ten Years: Expectations, Demand
and Consumption. In order to capture both
technical and consumer perspectives, the
Taskforce brings together experts from a range of
backgrounds and organisations, including EE,
Freeview, Goldsmiths College, Microsoft, Sony
and Virgin Media. Each workstream is guided by
a number of key questions, which are reflections
of the key issues currently facing the industry.
24
May-June 2013
www.csimagazine.com
Research into issues and
factors that shape
technological and societal
developments such as politics,
economics, the legal system and the environment
will be completed by each workstream. The
outcomes will feed into the final Taskforce
recommendations and the final report.
Each workstream is managed by an advisory
group consisting of relevant industry experts as
well as DTG staff. Skills and R&D expertise are
common themes running through each area as
it is vital that the UK delivers the technical
talent needed for innovation and thus provides
support for future television technologies. Thus,
the advisory groups aim to uncover examples
of where industry and academic collaboration
would be beneficial to encourage the development
of the right skills and expertise for the industry.
The first FITT status report was published on 2
May 2013 and distributed at the DTG Summit.
The Taskforce will produce two more status
updates, which will be published as electronic
reports available from the DTG website, in
August and November 2013 followed by a final
report in March 2014. For more information on
the Taskforce, its work streams and to download a
copy of the report please visit http://dtg.org.uk/
projects/fittt_latest.html
Simon Gauntlett is technology
director at the DTG, the industry
association for DTV in the UK.
This is the latest in a line of
regular guest columns to
provide CSI readers with updates on the
DTG’s initiatives and activities.
Dexter House, No. 2 Royal Mint Court,
London, UK
Tuesday 25 & Wednesday 26 June 2013
LONDON CONFERENCE
IBC Technology Booster
Designed for technical professionals, the IBC London Technology Booster
leverages IBC’s renowned expertise to provide the very latest insights into
the two most disruptive technologies that are irrevocably changing the
industry - Cloud Services and Connected Content.
Day 1: Floating Cloud Concepts for New Business
Day 2: Connecting Content - From the Networks into the Home
A Unique Learning Experience
This event will engage you in a unique learning experience designed to ensure that you will leave with a
deeper understanding of the key technologies for each topic. Unashamedly technical in its approach, this
event will break down the barriers between vendors, broadcasters, delegates and speakers, supported by
pre-event interaction, facilitated networking and lively debate.
• benefit from more than 15
hours of networking and
learning
• reach a deeper
understanding of how to
overcome major technical
challenges
• effectively assess the
future shape of the media
and broadcasting industry
and the role you and your
company will play in it
• establish new partnerships,
stronger peer relationships
and potential new
collaborative connections
with major organisations
• share knowledge peer
to peer of the challenges
inherent to your business
and the solutions for how to
overcome them
• gain essential technical
knowledge enabling you
to deal with technical
questions, solve problems,
prepare proposals, present
solutions and boost
productivity
Industry Leading Speakers include:
• Bob Harris Chief Technology Officer, Channel 4
Television
• John Honeycutt EVP and Chief Operating
Officer, Discovery Networks International
• Professor Ed Candy CTO, 3 Group
• John Zubryzcki Principle Technologist,
R&D BBC
View the programme, full speaker list and register now.
www.ibc.org/technologybooster
Interview
Q &A
Talking Ka-band
CSI spoke to Thomas Van den Driessche, Newtec’s VP of market strategy, about the challenges and
opportunities facing satellite Ka-band service in Europe and elsewhere
Thomas Van den Driessche
What are the pros of
Ka-band apart from the
fact that it extends
satellite capacity within
the existing footprint?
Ka-band satellites use
spot beams, which
means that each antenna
on the satellite transmits
to a relatively small
geographical area on the
ground (typically a few
hundred kilometres in
radius). This allows transmissions with higher
power levels than with wide beams, because the
power is concentrated on a smaller area.
Ka-band makes satellite more profitable for
service providers. Moreover it makes satellite
communications affordable for regions across the
globe that are difficult to reach through terrestrial
means, making it important in the context of
closing the digital divide. Ka-band also solves the
issue of lack of availability of satellite bandwidth
in regions such as Europe and markets with
quickly increasing data rates such as government
and defence, broadcast etc. Other advantages
include smaller dishes leading to increased
mobility and frequency re-use.
What are the biggest business opportunities
relating to Ka-band in Europe, both from Newtec’s
perspective and that of your customers?
The biggest opportunity might be consumer
broadband because of low cost terminals, efficient
use of satellite resources and low service
activation costs, including self-installation.
Other opportunities are fast news gathering and
file transfer, distribution of regional TV in areas
with limited rain fade, IP Trunking, and mobility.
We definitely see a clear trend towards Ka-band
with several successful satellite launches in 2012.
As a result we are now shipping Ka-band
26
May-June 2013
equipment for consumer broadband and IP
trunking for various customers.
Avanti Communications, for example, launched
its HYLAS 2 satellite which utilises Newtec’s
Broadband Hubs to extend its IP service range.
Avanti’s customers will be able to offer a true
broadband experience to B2B and B2C customers
in EMEA. One of them is InSat, who became the
first customer to install our broadband terminal
technology which is delivering Ka-Band
communications across Afghanistan. Yahsat also
implemented our technology to offer high-speed,
Ka-band IP trunking service under their brand
YahCarrier, which is set to be the region’s first
Ka-band IP trunking service.
The original perception of Ka-band was that it
would be more for high speed Internet than TV.
Has this changed and if so why?
Operating a multi-spot Ka-band platform has been
proven to be a challenging endeavour if it targets a
single managed service offering. Satellite and
ground infrastructure investment are high and
speed of network roll-out is typically slow showing
a deep dip in the hockey stick model. With the
availability of commercial Ka-band services,
people have experienced that the ground segment
innovations like ACM minimise the performance
degradation of the service. The main issues when
facing Ka-band are the service availability and
the possibility to offer constant bitrates in an
adaptive environment.
Is Ka-band now being envisaged for TV and if so
which type of services? What future does it have
here?
It can be linked to the broadband flavour of TV in
the future, as well as multiservice platform that
also include video services over Ka.
TV services can quickly be set up to fill the
capacity in case Ka capacity cannot be entirely
filled with broadband services.
www.csimagazine.com
The perception that Ka-band is susceptible to rain
is surely not false, because water absorbs radiation
much more in those wavelengths above 26.5 GHz?
So is it the case that mitigation techniques have
reduced this effect?
Newtec has launched its FlexACM exactly to
counter fading and interference issues in (highly)
adaptive networks. On top of the adaptive
modulation and coding technology Newtec’s
FlexACM also includes technologies that counter
noise & distortion (NoDE), that takes care of
small variations and link performance predictions
(ThiMM) in order to allow the highest throughput
in adaptive (also Ka-band) networks.
Is antenna size and cost still a constraint for
consumer applications?
Service providers prefer to put the cost of the
terminal in the service fee. This means subsidising
the terminal cost initially. So the cost of the
terminal is a key element in their business case.
At Newtec, we make no pricing difference
between terminals for consumer broadband access
using Ka or Ku.
What are the prospects for Ka-band for consumer
broadband? And what are the constraints and
opportunities?
The success of consumer broadband over satellite
is these days mainly driven by the cost of the
service. The main contributor to that cost is the
satellite capacity in the case of a large consumer
network. As Ka-band brings down the cost per bit
it generates a shift in favour of satellite to the
equation between cost of terrestrial infrastructure
and the number of users in a certain area.
Funding initiatives by governments and the
European Union will drive service providers to
build business cases for universal service
obligation. The availability for service providers to
have access to Ka-spectrum to build their services
will be a key enabling factor.
www.csimagazine.com
Sponsored by
CDN roundtable
CDN roundtable
Panellists:
Goran Nastic (Chair)
Goran is currently the Editor of CSI) a bi-monthly publication that covers broadcasting technologies and
content distribution, including IPTV and home networking. He has ten years of experience writing about the
ICT sector. Prior to joining the magazine, Goran was an industry analyst at a telecoms research house
visiongain, where he focused on mobile market trends and developments. Goran has also worked as an
Assistant Editor for Asian Communications, a monthly trade publication focused on Asian telco markets.
Derek Gough, senior director,
Media and Internet, Level 3
Derek oversees product management within
this vertical, working closely with partners
and customers to maximise the value of
Level 3’s Content Delivery Network. Level 3
Communications provides local, national
and global communications services to enterprise, government and
carrier customers. The company serves customers in more than 450
markets in 55 countries over a global services platform anchored by
owned fiber networks on three continents and undersea facilities.
Maria Ingold, CEO, mireality
Maria heads up mireality, a technical
consultancy in video-on-demand delivery,
specialising in the secure delivery of
premium content in the first rights window.
Maria has created complete end-to-end VoD
solutions for cable and broadband, and
pushed through changes to the DTG D-Book 7 to accommodate the
secure delivery of premium pay content to other services and devices.
Prior, Maria was Head of Technology for FilmFlex Movies, where she
set technical strategy and architected its technical solutions.
John Bird, principal consultant, Futuresource
John is an international expert on consumer
electronics, digital media, mobile,
broadband and wireless sectors. John is
responsible for directing many of the
strategic consulting projects Futuresource
undertakes in digital media, convergence
and devices, and has worked with many blue chip companies. He
joined after eight years at Motorola, where he was director of business
research for the Corporate Strategy Office in the EMEA region.
Jacques Le Mancq - CEO, Broadpeak
Jacques drives the strategy and execution of
the company, the #1 European provider of
IP video delivery solutions to telcos. Prior
to co-founding Broadpeak, Jacques was with
the Technicolor Connect Division where he
assumed the role of Product Line Manager
for the SmartVision video distribution servers product family. He led
a spin-off project with five other co-founders to create Broadpeak. He
has won two Emmy Awards for his work on MPEG-2 testing.
CDN roundtable
In its latest roundtable, a group of panellists assembled to discuss current
trends in the market for content delivery networks, an area of significance
as the volume of online video grows ever larger
28
May-June 2013
www.csimagazine.com
CDN roundtable
Chair: How would you characterise the market now
and how it compares to the early days of CDNs?
John Bird: What we’re seeing worldwide is huge
traffic in video, both in fixed and mobile. What is
driving it largely today is free video in its various
forms. Smartphones and increasingly tablets are
driving this growth, some 70% of tablets owners
regularly watch video, and our data shows this
will surge as these device proliferate.
Maria Ingold: We’ve always needed to ensure that
we’re meeting the customer’s quality of experience
expectations as well as the studio’s security
requirements. We have to deliver content in a way
that doesn’t have breakages and is also fast, geo-IP
restricted and DRM protected, for streaming or
downloading. So it’s always a balance between
these two requirements.
Derek Gough: The market has seen three phases
of evolution and is certainly more advanced today
in terms of the technology behind CDNs. The
first phase was driven by fairly large,
de-centralised CDNs designed to handle the
offload of static content, such as small images.
The second phase was the explosion of video,
which was primarily from 2002 to 2009. Video
became the dominant form of content on the
internet and the raison d’etre for using a CDN
during this period. The third phase started around
2010 and is characterised by the general notion
that web acceleration and optimisation are now
key to enhancing end-users’ web browsing and
transaction experiences.
Jacques Le Mancq: What is interesting from our
standpoint is of course that OTT traffic is growing
very fast. But when you take a closer look at what
type of traffic is carried on the network, you see
that it is not only catch-up or free content, but a
lot of live OTT content as well, including
premium. This comes a bit as a surprise because
we usually feel that live is meant for broadcast
networks. As an example, BBC data from the
Olympics shows that everyone wanted to watch
sports events in real time, inducing a live traffic
up to 7x bigger than VoD traffic. We believe that
live traffic over these new devices will be the next
big thing.
JB: I have to agree. In France we found that
watching live is 50% bigger than on-demand.
There’s no doubt that people want live content.
Right now, 80% of traffic is probably live,
followed by catch-up and downloads.
MI: On the other hand, Thinkbox recently noted
that 15% of PVR owners never watch any live TV.
I’m definitely one of those, but then I don’t watch
news or sports. I found it interesting to hear that
the BBC spent as much time testing as developing
in preparation for the Olympics in order to make
sure that the quality of service was there. I know
they had 111M video requests and 12M were
from mobile devices. All the trends point to
increasing usage from mobile devices.
Chair: Given that the amount of live OTT traffic
seemed to have caught everyone off guard, what are
the implications of this for networks?
JLM: Live OTT traffic will have a strong impact
on the operator network at different levels. It will
highlight bottlenecks at the backbone, backhaul
and access network levels. And in order to avoid
massive and costly network upgrades we believe
that telecom and cable operators need to put in
place a more scalable way than unicast to deliver
live television to new screens.
JB: Around 400m people watched the Royal
wedding online worldwide and even YouTube
wasn’t sure if they could handle those numbers of
simultaneous viewers online although they did it
in the end. The quality maybe wasn’t full HD but
it was good enough. But essentially, you’ve got live
vs pre-recorded content and then you’ve also got
download for portability so there are two types of
live if you like.
DG: Our customers’ demands have changed in
line with the evolution of the market. In the early
days, their main objectives were to reduce costs
and there was a dependence on a heavy
infrastructural load that they would have to
manage themselves. Today, the level of awareness
of CDNs is infinitely greater. As a consequence,
we see across every market segment a greater
understanding among enterprises that the
performance of their online presence is key to
overall business performance.
MI: The stats show that IPTV from telcos is
increasing, albeit slowly. They’re aiming to get
more into the content delivery market. On the
other side you have the CDN companies trying to
figure out new ways to monetise, so they’re now
offering value add services like transcoding. And
then you have companies like Netflix who want a
really good customer experience at a low cost. So
they’ve created their Open Connect caching
system, which they are looking to move all of
their delivery towards. A number of things are
changing the CDN landscape.
Chair: What does this mean in terms of the various
relationships and business models?
JB: CDNs are basically the delivery basket for all
this content and will get paid. The conflict is on
the service provider level who having put in the
infrastructure to continue to ramp up broadband
capability don’t get paid because largely the video
is free content, either as part of a subscription or
totally free. Broadband is where the game lies now
it’s a complete shift from the traditional payTV
model where you had a carriage payment to take
that content to your subscribers. The CDN layer,
they are in the driving seat because the content
provider has to reach the edge to actually deliver
across that infrastructure and therein lies that
model - they are providing the networks that are
taking it from point of origin out to the service
infrastructure. Whether it’s owned by a carrier or
not that’s a question of economics for the carrier
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
29
CDN roundtable
and whether it’s worth investing deeper in the
network or outsourcing to a third party. Overall,
CDNs and operators both have to invest in the
network to cope with the sheer volume of traffic.
JLM: Some content providers and some CDN
service providers are now pushing for putting
their own cache servers directly in operators’
datacenters. This approach can have some interest
for small operators because it will reduce their
transit cost. But the problem is that if they accept
this from one player, an Akamai for example, they
will have to accept it from others too: Limelight,
Level 3… They will end up losing control of their
own infrastructure, piling up different components
that they don’t own. We believe that if an operator
can combine all that traffic and own its own
infrastructure, it will be in better control when it
comes to making decisions about resource
allocation, while respecting net neutrality. We are
hearing some service providers asking for private
peering payments, renting of wholesale CDN
services… these are different strategies. If
operators want to play in the CDN space, they
need to ask themselves what they can do that the
CDN service providers can’t. Operators are late to
the CDN market and still have to prove how they
can differentiate. It’s not an easy decision.
JB: The conflict at the moment is you have users
who only watch online streams so you are creating
enormous demand in the local loop and payTV
companies - who are moving heavily into TV
Everywhere - are putting their own infrastructure
right back to their own servers to make sure they
can deliver. It’s much more marginal if you are a
broadband provider pure and simple.
JLM: It makes sense that payTV OTT companies
try and deploy their own CDN infrastructure to
cut their CDN cost. However, telecoms and cable
operators should not accept to host 3rd party
infrastructure into their own network. If as a
network operator, you accept to put different
boxes from different payTV ‘partners’ it will cost
30
May-June 2013
you more, in terms of network interconnection,
power and cooling, so you are making you data
centre available to everybody for free while you
could optimise traffic from different platform by
carrying it on a common infrastructure you own
and that is optimised to carry traffic from
multiple payTV sources.
JB: Do you see a basic challenge to the traditional
economic peering model of the internet?
DG: It is not inconceivable that the peering
model may cease to be relevant in the future.
Peering, whilst essentially based on equitable
exchange of traffic, is not ‘free’ – there are costs
associated with operating a model based on
peering economics. Based on current trends of
improving economies of scale, it is possible that
there will come a time when the economics of
peering do not necessarily offer a significant cost
advantage to simply purchasing transit.
JLM: We are hearing more and more operators
saying that the free peering model with CDNs (or
with a symbolic transit cost) does not work
anymore. Telecoms and cable companies want to
preserve their CapEx, and realise that if they can
delay the investments into network capacity a
little by being smart and positioning caches they
control in their infrastructure, it can represent a
big saving.
MI: Comcast and other companies are working
on QAM to IP conversion gateways which will
essentially be a home hub that transcodes content
to all the different formats required and delivers it
using DTCP to the devices within the home.
What do you make of these?
JLM: We’ve seen these initiatives and they make
sense. It’s about doing broadcast until the
ultimate edge which is in the home and this is
what we are pushing with our nanoCDN
initiative. We are saying that broadband gateways
and STBs in the home can act as caches, with
www.csimagazine.com
various amounts of storage and CPU power. We
do multicast to the edge; for live OTT we take the
live multi-screen channels that are unicast by
nature, make them available as multicast and
convert the signal back to unicast in the home
gateway. This way, we make sure that live TV is
scalable. This approach also allows operators to
offer something different compared to a
traditional CDN provider, and this benefits
everybody. Even for the likes of big operators
such as Comcast, it is difficult to be more
competitive than Level 3 or Akamai, because their
fraction of the market is small compared to CDN
global players. Only by leveraging their unique
assets, such as their managed network,
transcoding capabilities, multicast technologies,
can they deliver a better UX and save a lot of
money in terms of access network, core and
backhaul. The nanoCDN technology that we are
promoting is really disruptive in the CDN space.
JB: Until now, real time transcoding on the fly
would have been prohibitively expensive but we
are in the domain now where it can be done. The
only thing is you are servicing a population of
users who are nomadic so the content feed is
often customised for the individual device.
Chair: Does that mean transcoding will be done in
the cloud in the future?
MI: You still have to ensure that the quality is
there for the different devices and that the
studio’s security requirements are being met. If
you transcode on the fly from a derivative and not
a high resolution mezzanine master, you will
suffer quality loss. I’m curious to see how well the
Comcast box does the conversion. And then of
course there’s ensuring that the content is as
securely DRM’d as required and that all the
studio’s usage rights are met.
As for the security of transcoding in the cloud,
well you still have to meet the studio’s security
requirements, especially if you’re storing high
resolution mezzanine masters. And if you’re using
CDN roundtable
the chain so that there is not a single point of
failure in any part of the network preventing
content from flowing. In addition, every
significant CDN will ensure full redundancy at
each point in the network to ensure that there is
no single point of failure.
Chair: Are you worried about more companies going
down the Netflix route and building their own
CDNs?
the cloud as a delivery network you need to
ensure checks like geo-IP restrictions are in place.
JLM: Transcoding on the fly is a very nice
technology but see two weaknesses at this point.
The first is that you need to interfere with the
protection. If you do transcoding you need to do
encryption and decryption. With the nanoCDN,
we don’t touch the DRM once the content leaves
the headend protected. The other limit is the
start-up time for live content. But we are working
on this with our partners. It has a good future for
satellite especially.
MI: With Ultra HD or 4K and 8K the quality is
increasing the bits. But then you have things like
HEVC that can process the quality better. And
you also have companies like eyeIO, which Netflix
uses, who say they can optimise delivery without
having to change the actual player technology.
Chair: Going back to QoS, there seem to be so
many variables involved, like encodes and decodes,
player devices, home conditions, CDNs etc. How do
you guarantee this in a streaming environment?
DG: There has been a widespread industry shift
towards adaptive video delivery over HTTP, due to
the greatly improved video quality, the ease of use
for end-users. In addition, a move away from
proprietary formats provides more flexibility for
content owners. For some, limitations of
proprietary standards incentivise a move towards
adaptive standards, but in general, the industry
move towards HLS, HDS or DASH has been
driven by the significantly improved end-user
experience.
MI: It has to do with monitoring, doing the
analytics, looking at the user experience,
comparing it, tweaking… it’s an on-going review.
DG: On the contrary. Firstly, it is only a small
number of the largest online companies for whom
it would make sense to create their own CDN due
to the volume of traffic that flows across their
networks. For those companies, Level 3 is very
well positioned to help them with the
implementation of those solutions due to the
broad range of products and services that we
offer. For all but the very largest of content
providers, an outsourced CDN is still more costeffective and will continue to be seen as the
primary solution.
Chair: Do LTE and mobile broadband down the
line pose a threat to CDNs and will they start taking
away more and more of the live OTT traffic?
JB: It is working today. The fact of the matter is
there are 34m users on Netflix and further tens of
millions of broadcasters’ catch up services. You
get the occasional outage but in the main people
who are delivering content have made sure they
have the end of end quality is there. You may have
to drop some frames here and then but even that’s
changing. It’s not an HD broadcast level but the
industry has managed to get it to an acceptable
level and it’s improving all the time.
JB: LTE is the next step function in mobile
broadband and the next big push. But you have to
manage it properly as they are already offloading
a big chunk of mobile video onto WiFi. They are
complimenting the fixed broadcast model which
is still the most cost effective way to reach static
screens and will be for years. Having said that,
faster speeds and increasing data bundles will
make cellular broadband a big deal. We think
around 70% of all long form video has come via
WiFi or fixed broadband in the last couple of
years because of this issue, but that will change as
4G takes off.
DG: CDNs by nature are inherently self-healing
and resilient. If a part of the network goes down,
content automatically defers to the next link in
DG: Mobile will be a key part of the evolution
going forward. This trend is at a nascent stage at
present and will evolve as content becomes more
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
31
CDN roundtable
widely available and optimised for mobile devices.
Today, scale is crucial for businesses who put
their websites at the forefront of their business
strategy. This will mean that players which do not
provide such scale could suffer and hence
consolidation in the market will take place with
only the largest of CDNs able to service the
volumes of content that are likely to be generated.
JLM: We believe that LTE will be very useful for
all operators, even those who want to deliver fixed
line services. We are seeing more and more LTE
routers on the market. In some cases, LTE might
displace fixed networks as it has enough
bandwidth for VoD content. What we see as a big
benefit for LTE is the eMBMS features, LTE is
finally going to make possible what DVB-H and
others failed to do. It will make new scenarios
possible for live events. The 4G architecture
resembles a full IP network and is much more
distributed and decentralised so CDNs make
much more sense. This paves the way for new and
exciting services.
JB: At the end of the day, 4G is just the next step
function. Mobile broadband is the biggest thing to
hit this industry. Worldwide, 25% of wireless
revenues come from data services and growing
fast, with video being the key driver. But they
need spectrum; therein lies the conflict. You’re
already cutting into fixed broadcast spectrum and
that will continue, which limits the expansion of
terrestrial broadcast although it doesn’t mean
DTT is going away.
MI: And they are trying to make sure that there’s
no cross leakage into the terrestrial spectrum
because it’s in the same bandwidth. That will be
interesting to see how that’s resolved.
Chair: Well, the UK’s House of Lords
Communications Committee called for TV services
to be delivered over the internet in the future so to
free up spectrum for wireless broadband. This
obviously will have an impact on CDNs and DTT…
32
May-June 2013
intention, if you talk specifically about terrestrial
broadcast that’s one case. The other is cable and
satellite, dedicated IPTV, where you have really
huge capacity in terms of distribution. So you
have two things: the value of spectrum, and the
issue of what you want to use IP delivery for, is it
time shift TV, which IP is cost effective, or is it to
reach wireless/mobile devices? As you’re still
broadcasting 95% of the content that’s effectively
live simulcast online. But again, that will change
as internet bandwidth and capacity increases.
DG: Absolutely. Up until quite recently, the
average home viewer consumed around four hours
of content via terrestrial broadcasting, with only
around four minutes via the internet. The point at
which IP distribution becomes the predominant
means of content distribution - when measured by
minutes consumed - will happen in the later part
of this decade. More content will be consumed
over IP than over terrestrial broadcast.
JB: In our view that’s a very long scenario. Right
now, in excess 95% of all viewing is either linear
or time shifted broadcast on a conventional cable,
satellite or DTT network. Online traffic is huge
but in the overall perspective of broadcast it’s still
in its infancy. Broadcast is such a cost effective
way of reaching a mass audience this shift won’t
happen for at least ten years. With online, when
you come to one-to-many situation, the numbers
just don’t add up, especially compared to satellite.
There are pure play online TV channels, but they
are almost fringe today.
JLM: The very popular channels will still be
broadcasted while the niche ones will never make
it to broadcast due to spectrum issues. So
broadcast will not go away because it’s very
efficient. Operators will need to implement some
form of multicast technology such as the
nanoCDN if they want to achieve scalability.
JB: The point about the government’s long term
www.csimagazine.com
Chair: Finally, Limelight Networks have said they
are preparing for a scenario where CDN costs
increase as opposed to keep decreasing because of
some telcos exerting more control over network
access as a result of the large growth in online video
that someone has to pay for. Do you think such a
scenario might happen?
MI: From a retailer perspective, if the studios are
taking 70%, that leaves you with a limited amount
to split among all the service providers and
platforms.
DG: I don’t foresee this happening in the short
term, but it is quite possible in the future, given
the ongoing exponential increase in high volume
delivery. Variables might be the cost of hosting,
notably power, but this is often offset by increases
in the efficiency of the technology used.
JLM: We don’t expect this to happen due to
falling hardware costs, but what could drive prices
up is transit costs and peering agreements. In the
case of Netflix building its own CDN, is it
because they couldn’t get the price down or
because nobody could monetise that traffic? We
believe cost will go down and that network
operators can drive them down especially in the
live component where they can use their multicast
enablers or transcode enablers so that when one
million people are watching the same live channel
from connected devices they use only a few Mbps
from their network.
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Teleports
Look to the skies...
and ground
David Adams weighs up the future of teleport services
W
herever you look in the
telecommunications
and broadcast media
industries, new
technologies are
driving swift,
significant changes.
The teleport services sector is no exception.
The key changes here are IP-based technologies,
access to which is becoming more important for
all teleport end-users, along with the growing
number of high throughput satellites (HTS),
which open up new possibilities for teleport
service development and provision. These
new technologies are acting like powerful
fertilisers in the teleport services markets,
stimulating the growth of dozens of competing
34 May-June 2013
service propositions.
Those services are being offered by companies
of various kinds, because, as has happened in
other industries, one noticeable consequence of
the move into an IP-based world has been a
blurring of boundaries between one kind of
company and another. It was once easy to
distinguish between a satellite operator and a
teleport operator, but today this is no longer
always so straightforward. Both teleport operators
and satellite operators have sought to expand
their service portfolios, with teleport operators
starting to offer services like video origination or
manipulation; and some satellite operators
seeking to deal direct with end-users.
At the same time as these changes taking
place, competition in this market is getting
tougher anyway, as end-users seek to cut costs
and increase efficiency wherever they can. So
what does the future hold for this swiftly-evolving
part of the industry?
www.csimagazine.com
Contradictory trends
The teleport market displays some contradictory
trends. Many teleport operators are seeking to
grow, to increase their commercial reach into new
markets as they broaden their operational
capabilities. Yet at the same time, other
companies are choosing to build strategies around
the delivery of specialist services, addressing
niche requirements, from military or maritime
services to occasional use applications or services
tailored to suit specific broadcast markets.
“The traditional incumbents have been
stepping out of this market since the late 90s,”
says José Sánchez Ruiz, director of service
operations at Eutelsat. “Some incumbents are still
playing important roles in certain regions, but
more and more new players have entered the
market, either by buying businesses or by starting
from scratch.
“From a technical point of view, the most
significant change is probably improved
performance,” he continues. “That comes with
smaller dishes and reduced costs. In the past
when you were talking about teleport you used to
be talking about 20 metre, 30m dishes that were
expensive to build. Today you are getting the
same performance from dishes that are around
4m. That is much more affordable.”
Robert Bell, executive director of the World
Teleport Association (WTA), says teleport
companies have worked hard to build on those
technical advances and make themselves
indispensable to end-users. “Every teleport
operator focuses on finding a value-added niche
they can serve, so that they become an
extension of the customer’s own business,
whether that business is maritime services for
cruise ships, or running enterprise networks for
oil companies, working for TV channels, or for
internet connectivity for specific regions.”
Whatever the focus of the teleport operator’s
activities, all seem to be equally affected by the
drive from end-users to cut costs. “Everybody’s
Teleports
objective is to get more for less,” says Ken
Armstrong, CEO of CET Teleport. One way
in which this trend is being expressed is a
tendency for teleport operators to become more
involved in the provision of ground services, to
provide end-users with more of an end-to-end
service proposition.
“Traditional teleport services are changing to
catch up with the trend for integration between
the space environment and the ground
environment,” notes David Hochner, CEO at
SatLink. “The teleport sector is getting more
and more involved with the ground segments
rather than the satellite segments. I can see
more and more teleports entering the content
management sector, more getting involved in
OTT applications, IPTV, fibre, bundled services,
rather than just satellite services. This is the
future of the teleport industry.”
“There is a general trend towards using VSAT
technologies and IP,” adds Ralph Brooker,
president of satellite industry training provider
SatProf. “There’s more use of TV over IP and
VoIP, so you’re seeing teleports hosting more
VSAT technologies to support more groups of
IP-based terminals.”
Meanwhile, the most important new
technology in the skies is surely HTS. These
satellites can offer capacity at a lower cost than
can Fixed Service Satellites (FSS), offering at
least double the total throughput of FSS while
still using the same amount of allocated orbital
spectrum. It’s clearly tempting for teleport
operators to try to work out how they might
“I can see more and
more teleports
entering the content
management sector,
more getting involved
in OTT applications,
IPTV, fibre, bundled
services, rather than
just satellite services.”
Image courtesy of CET Teleport
exploit these capabilities. But this is still a new
technology, as CET’s Armstrong points out.
“There are people looking to try Ka-band services,
which is something that is very much in its
infancy,” he says. “It is an unknown for both
customers and providers.”
“More and more people are moving towards
Ka-band applications,” insists Thomas Weisner,
global sales manager at signal processing
specialist WORK Microwave. “Demand for
Ka-band is really enormous right now. This is a
major trend.”
But working with Ka-band and Ku-band may
also force teleport operators to alter their business
models, says Brooker. “These satellites have much
more complex beam structures, so in those cases
a teleport may not be able to function
autonomously so easily any more,” he explains. “It
may become more important to belong to a group
of teleports that serves a group of satellites,
because the satellite has got smaller sizes and
each covers a smaller area. So you need teleports
to be in multiple locations.
“I think that will be a trend: that in order to
support these satellites there have to be dedicated
networks that can interact with each other
directly.” He also believes new types of satellite,
like the 03b satellite constellation, will also have a
noticeable impact on the teleport industry, as
working with such hardware creates more
complexity for teleports.
But even taking these changes and the fact that
teleport operators are developing more specialised
services into account, the level of competition in
the market has reached a point where teleport
operators need to find other ways to differentiate
their service offerings.
“You have to accept that all teleport operators
can offer the same services,” says Armstrong.
“There are two ways to set yourself apart: one is
having a good quality 24/7 helpdesk, multilingual
if possible; and the second is the quality of service
that you offer.
“So with a contended service, if a customer
signs up for a 10:1 service you must make sure
they get that, not a 20:1 service. That tends to
make you not the cheapest supplier in the
marketplace, but you have to stand above the
others and say you will guarantee quality of
service on contention ratios.”
Armstrong is also sure that hub-based services
will continue to dominate the market. “In the past
everybody was very pro- individual links and not
needing hub-based services, but now those make
life much easier,” he argues. “At the moment I
can’t see this changing in the next few years. I
think hub-based services will continue to
dominate, especially in the data marketplace.”
Smaller operators may be able to differentiate
their services through an ability to offer more
flexible services, suggests Eutelsat’s Ruiz.
“Smaller players can be more flexible, more
reactive in some cases,” he says. “For example
they may be well-placed to offer occasional use
services. Sometimes they are very quick to
implement a customised solution.”
Ripe for consolidation?
If they cannot do this, smaller teleport operators
may well be swallowed up: this is a market that
seems ready for a spell of consolidation activity,
as the larger operators seek to expand the scale of
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
35
Teleports
Top teleport operators of 2012
The Independent Top Twenty
The Global Top Twenty
The “Fast Twenty”
1.
1. 1. Harris CapRock (USA)
Intelsat S.A. (Luxembourg)
Encompass Digital Media (USA)
2. GlobeCast (France)
2. SES (Luxembourg)
2. Elara Comunicaciones SA (Mexico)
3. Arqiva Broadcast & Media (UK)
3. Eutelsat (France)
3. CETel (Germany)
4. Globecomm (Services revenue) (USA)
4. Telesat (Canada)
4. TeleCommunications Systems (Govt Svcs)
5. Encompass Digital Media (USA)
5. SingTel Satellite (Singapore)
5. NewSat (Australia)
6. TeleCommunications Systems Inc.
6. Harris CapRock (USA)
6. Essel Shyam Communication (India)
7. EchoStar Satellite Services (USA)
7. Thaicom (Thailand)
7. RRsat Global Communications (Israel)
8. GlobeCast (France)
8. Jordan Media City (Jordan)
8. Du (Emirates Integrated Telecom) (UAE)
9. Arqiva Broadcast & Media (UK)
9. AsiaSat (China)
9. Signalhorn Trusted Networks (Germany)
10. Hispasat (Spain)
10. Globecomm (Services revenue) (USA)
10. NewSat (Australia)
11. AsiaSat (China)
11. Hawaii Pacific Teleport (USA)
11. Essel Shyam Communication (India)
12. Globecomm (Services revenue) (USA)
12. RRsat Global Communications (Israel)
12. SatLink Communications (Israel)
13. Encompass Digital Media (USA)
13. Emirates Integrated Telecom
13. CETel (Germany)
14. Thaicom Public Company Ltd (Thailand)
14. Jordan Media City (Jordan)
15. TeleCommunications Systems Inc.
14. STN (Slovenia)
15. CET Teleport (Germany)
16. NewCom International (USA)
16. RRsat Global Communications (Israel)
16. SingTel Satellite (Singapore)
17. STN (Slovenia)
17. MEASAT Satellite Systems (Malaysia)
17. CET Teleport (Germany)
18. Elara Comunicaciones SA (Mexico)
18. Gazprom Space Systems (Russia)
18. Eutelsat (France)
19. Cobbett Hill Earth Station (UK)
19. Du (Emirates Integrated Telecom) (UAE)
19. Intelsat (Luxembourg)
20. Europe Media Port (Cyprus)
20. Signalhorn Trusted Networks (Germany)
20. MEASAT Satellite Systems (Malaysia)
(Govt Services revenue) (USA)
(Government Services revenue) (USA)
(Du) (UAE)
15. EchoStar Satellite Services (USA)
Source: The World Teleport Association
services they are able to offer, to meet
international needs.
“We can see more and more opportunities for
M&A between teleports,” says SatLink’s Hochner.
“There will be more opportunities for acquisition,
because a small operator cannot provide complete
international solutions. If you want to be able to
go beyond your own country you need to offer a
variety of services to minimise your risks.”
On the other hand, the WTA’s Bell says he can
see no end to the supply of smaller companies
coming into the industry to serve niche
requirements (see table). “My observation is that
there are never-ending processes of consolidation
and entrepreneurship,” he says. “There are
dozens, if not hundreds of small teleport
operators springing up. That is the sign of a very
healthy market. That to me is the real dynamic:
the migration of talent and capital into creating
more value.”
Nor will the drive to expand the range of
services inevitably lead to consolidation in every
case, according to Ruiz. “I expect to see more
synergies between teleports using partnerships,”
36
May-June 2013
he says. “For example a good teleport operator
in Europe may have customers asking them to
deliver services in Asia. So they might buy
services from a teleport operator there. The
customer then has a one-stop shop. And it could
work the other way round too, if the Asian
teleport operator wants to be able to provide a
service in Europe.”
As for the future of the industry, it seems
certain that teleport operators’ chief
preoccupation will be finding ways to offer ever
more capacity and speed to end users. “More
bandwidth, especially for IP traffic, and higher
data rates,” asserts WORK’s Weisner, when asked
to sum up future trends in teleport.
When one considers the broadcast sector, for
example, the continued growth of OTT services
and perhaps some development of ultra-HD
4K services may also help to drive demand for
more capacity.
Ka-band and HTS seem certain to become ever
more important in the teleport world. “We expect
use of Ka-band to grow further,” says Weisner.
“We have seen increased interest in that for two to
www.csimagazine.com
three years, but this year has seen the biggest
growth so far and we think this will be maintained
for the next two to three years, because lots
of people will change their equipment or add
new equipment.”
WTA’s Bell suggests that platforms like
Intelsat’s Epic may indicate the shape of things to
come: a platform that uses C- and Ku-bands as
well as Ka-band, with wide beams, spot beams
and frequency reuse solutions. “It’s taking the
technology that makes Ka-band technology work,
sharing frequencies among many small beams,
global beams and spot beams,” he adds.
“The present and future is driven by the new
generation of satellites with capacity in Ka-band,
multiple beams and higher bandwidth,” notes
Eutelsat’s Ruiz, and in the ground segment by a
new generation of modulations supporting higher
bit rates.
“This is going to be a world where capacities
are going to go way, way up,” says Bell. “So there
are great opportunities for teleport operators to
benefit from that and help their customers to take
advantage of it.”
High Performance.
Open Architecture.
When you have it all, that’s
At Intelsat we’re used to big things.
We already own and operate the biggest satellite, teleport and fiber
infrastructure network in the world. But we’ve got even bigger plans.
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platform with an innovative combination of C-, Ku- and Ka-bands,
wide beams, spot beams, and frequency re-use. For broadcasters
and media applications this means:
• Content Regionalization: advertising, time zone, language
• Customization: bitrate, resolution, encoding format
• More Throughput: HD content to smaller terminals
• Backward Compatibility: better performance through
existing infrastructure
For you, this means lower cost of ownership.
More control. More choices. That’s Epic.
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www.intelsatepic.com
MPEG-DASH
DASH it all
Richard E Doherty, director, E-Media Technology Strategy
Office of the CTO at Dolby Laboratories, explains the inner
workings of MPEG-DASH and the spec’s future prospects
I
n the delivery of multimedia content over
the internet, varying and unpredictable
bandwidth across supporting networks has
provided a challenge for content providers
in ensuring a consistently high quality
of experience for viewers.
Recognising this obstacle to full
realisation of the potential of multimedia
streaming over the internet, the Moving Picture
Experts Group (MPEG), a working group of ISO/
IEC, developed the MPEG-DASH (Dynamic
Adaptive Streaming over HTTP) specification
(ISO/IEC 23009). This suite of standards, ratified
and published in April 2012, supports the
efficient and easy streaming of multimedia using
existing available HTTP infrastructure.
DASH examined
The power of DASH rests in part in its adaptive
streaming capabilities. DASH is built on adaptive
bit rate streaming technology in which multimedia
files are encoded multiple times at various bitrates
and delivered to a client on demand to adapt
quickly to changing bandwidths. The packets are
delivered using the same hypertext
transfer protocol (HTTP) data
communication that has long served as
the foundation for the World Wide Web.
While segments can contain any media
data, the DASH specification offers
specific guidance and formats for use
with the ISO Media File Format or
MPEG-2 transport stream, which covers
just about all of the multimedia content
in use today.
The DASH adaptive streaming
manifest file delivered from server to
client is referred to as a media
presentation description (MPD). This
XML-based file describes segment
information such as program timing and
URL, accessibility features, digital rights
management (DRM), and media
38 May-June 2013
characteristics such as encoding format, video
resolution, and, of course, bit rates. Live or
on-demand content is encoded at a variety of bit
rates (often a dozen or more), and each version is
stored and accessed via a unique URL address.
(This model gives operators the option of serving
different versions from different locations and/or
over different networks for further flexibility in
maximising bandwidth usage.)
Information within the MPD sent from the
HTTP server allows the client to request the
optimal segment fragment (and bit rate)
according to current bandwidth availability and
processing power available for bit stream
decoding. HTTP “GET” requests are sent by the
client every few seconds, assuring that the best
possible audio and video quality — free from
dropped frames or buffering delays — is being
provided at all times. The shift between source
files of different bit rates is seamless, ensuring
continuous playback for the viewer.
DASH enables the low-cost deployment of
streaming services using existing internet
infrastructure without any special provisions.
www.csimagazine.com
The specification supports
both on-demand and live
streaming and can be used
with any media format.
While DASH is not alone in
its implementation of adaptive
streaming, it is a particularly compelling
streaming platform because it offers the industry a
non-proprietary means of delivering media to a
wide range of devices.
The DASH towards a unified standard
The MPEG-DASH specification is one of several
streaming platforms, including Apple’s HTTP
Live Streaming (HLS), Microsoft’s Smooth
Streaming, and Adobe’s HTTP Dynamic
Streaming, that rely on HTTP streaming as their
underlying delivery method. While all of these
proprietary streaming platforms typically use the
MPEG-4 H.264 video codec along with MPEG
Advanced Audio Coding (AAC), each employs its
own segment fragmenting techniques, sequence
timing, and manifest formats. Thus, if consumer
devices are to receive and display content from a
server implementing any one of these platforms,
they must support the corresponding client
protocol. By serving as a widely accepted standard
for HTTP streaming of multimedia content,
DASH would allow a standards-based client to
stream content from any standards-based server.
Because DASH includes a
relatively generic container
specification, it can support a wide
assortment of data and codecs.
DASH allows the incorporation of
subtitles, accessibility features,
content ratings, and other metadata.
Its extended technical capabilities
include progressive download of
on-demand content, enhanced trick
modes, ad insertion, and random
access, as well as support for
common encryption and multiple
DRM models. Any DASH-compliant
DRM may be implemented by a
content provider with no changes to
the underlying specification or
protocols, so the extension of
premium programming and services
MPEG-DASH
via connected devices can be undertaken without
compromising the security of content.
Leading media technology companies and
content providers participated in the design of the
MPEG-DASH specification in an effort to reduce
the number of streaming protocols required to
reach most devices. By establishing
interoperability among all variety of servers and
clients, widespread adoption of DASH would
bring about a dramatic simplification in the
preparation and delivery of multimedia content to
broad array of target clients, which today include
connected TVs, computers, streaming players,
gaming consoles, tablets, and smartphones. With
a unified standard, content providers could
produce a single set of files for delivery to any
DASH-compatible device.
Increasing the interoperability of DASH
In creating the DASH specification, the MPEG
designed only the way in which content is
segmented, not the codecs or profiles used. Today,
the DASH Industry Forum (DASH IF),
comprising industry leaders — such as founding
members Akamai, Ericsson, Microsoft, Netflix,
Qualcomm, and Samsung — who contributed to
the original MPEG-DASH specification, is
working to create a set of profiles that will
increase the interoperability of the DASH
streaming platform. These and other companies
view MPEG DASH as a tool for simplifying and
unifying the delivery of IP video, a shift that will
offer new business models for service providers
and operators and support other breakthroughs in
media delivery.
The DASH IF Interoperability Working Group
currently focuses on the development of
DASHAVC-264. DASHAVC-264 is being designed
to offer service providers, operators, encoding
solution providers, and client vendors a set of
interoperability guidelines along with the test
cases, test vectors, and software tools they need to
build and deploy DASH-compliant solutions. The
DASHAVC-264 guidelines offer best practices and
the specifics required for actual implementation
of MPEG-DASH. The guidelines specify codecs,
file types, and details of the HTTP transmission
syntax. All of these details provide practical
guidance intended to assure that various players
and clients will in fact work together.
DASHing ahead
In a few years, video content will continue to
comprise the vast majority of internet traffic and
continue to grow. Facilitating broad
interoperability among servers and devices,
DASH promises to be a key enabler of this new
media landscape, in turn making it easier and
more economical for operators to provide media
consumers with an exceptional audio and video
experience over the internet. Around the world,
both standards bodies and content providers
already are moving to take advantage of DASH.
In Europe, version 1.5 of the HbbTV (Hybrid
Broadcast Broadband TV) standard, released late
in 2012, includes support for MPEG-DASH.
HbbTV first was intended to support distribution
of premium and free Internet content over
broadband connections to smart TVs and hybrid
set-tops in combination with over-the-air digital
terrestrial TV (DTT). The new multiscreen
streaming version of HbbTV has fuelled
commercial momentum for DASH testing and
implementation, and it is significant because half
of Western Europe’s installed market of TV sets is
expected (by the HbbTV Consortium) to be
HbbTV-compliant by next year.
In the US, numerous demonstrations at
the 2013 NAB Show illustrate the rapidly
rising number of vendors supporting MPEGDASH in their encoders, streaming software,
DRM platforms, and other products. Chip
manufacturers already are building MPEG-DASH
into chipsets designed for smartphones. With
respect to implementation, some of the industry’s
leading streaming content providers are strongly
supportive of MPEG-DASH. Using DASH, such
companies can achieve both high efficiency and
high visual quality in the delivery of streaming
content, which translates to a great media
experience and higher rates of consumer
satisfaction.
Given the ubiquity of Apple’s HLS format
and the promise and momentum of DASH,
content providers and their multiscreen
operations may be best served by an investment
in support for both DASH and HLS streaming
platforms in the short term. HLS is a fixture in
present-day streaming services, but DASH may
well be the streaming platform that moves the
industry forward.
In the Office of the CTO at Dolby, a Diamond
SMPTE member, Richard E Doherty works
on standards including DECE, DLNA, SCSA,
and DASH, and on the company’s advanced
technology strategy including investigation of future
technologies. He will present “Internet Media
Delivery Formats — A DASH to the Races” at the
Entertainment Technology in the Internet Age
(ETIA) conference, presented in June by SMPTE
and the Stanford Center for Image Systems
Engineering (SCIEN).
www.csimagazine.com
May-June 2013
39
IP media security
Hack to the future –
taking steps to protect
your content
Stuart Cleary outlines the ways in which content providers
can counter the multiple threats of internet piracy
W
ith the ever
increasing growth
of online video
consumption, and
the explosive
growth in internet
connected devices
over the past five years, content publishers have an
extraordinary opportunity to leverage the internet
to reach wider audiences and explore new business
models for their video assets. Key to enabling
success, however, lies in meeting the contractual
obligations of the content owners. Contractual
obligations can amount to the ability of the content
distributor, such as a broadcaster or over-the-top
service provider, to protect content that is being
distributed over IP networks, such as the internet,
from unauthorized use and redistribution.
The reason is simple: content piracy
fundamentally threatens the content publisher’s
ability to monetise its valuable assets. Take 2012
as an example. In 2012 the most illegally
download movie was ProjectX, which was
downloaded a total of 8.7 million times. If you
take an average cost of EUR4.99 to stream a
“In 2012 the most
illegally download
movie was ProjectX,
which was down­
loaded a total of 8.7
million times.”
movie online, this would be the equivalent of
EUR43.4 million in lost revenue, at least that’s
how the media and entertainment industry view
it. The most illegally downloaded TV programme
in 2012 was “Game of Thrones”, which was
downloaded a total of 4.3 million times. Again, in
terms of potential loss of revenue, the cost could
be estimated at EUR12.8 million Euros, if you
take an average price of EUR2.99 per download.
So it’s no surprise that content owners view
piracy as an illegal activity equivalent to walking
into a store and stealing a DVD. Securing
Edge Server
Player Heuristics
HD Player Verification
Player Hash Generation
HD Media Encryption
Content Targeting
Figure 1 - SecureHD multi layered Content protection
40 May-June 2013 www.csimagazine.com
Media Decryption
Player Video
HD Token Authorization
Player Runtime
physical media in a physical
brick and mortar store is
relatively straightforward.
Securing media assets being
distributed over IP networks is a much more
complex task, and one that requires a multilayered approach employing different techniques
to defend against different threats. In addition,
content protection needs to strike the right
balance between business and legal requirements,
end user experience, and cost.
Attack and defence
There are a number of ways that video content
can be compromised when it comes to internet
distribution. Attacks on video content can come
in the following ways:
• Link Sharing - unauthorised users obtain
access to premium/paid content, bypassing
a retailer’s business model;
• Deep Linking – A hacker decompiles the
player and posts hidden links to his own site
in order to monetize the content;
• Player Hijacking – Theft of the player,
followed by copying it to a different website,
thereby bypassing attributions to the origin
site;
Stream Ripping - Theft of the actual content
from the stream while it is being delivered to
client systems;
Stealing from cache - Theft of the content from
a browser, player cache or disk; and
Content tampering - Modification of the actual
content (e.g., replacing/injecting unwanted
advertisements into the stream).
There are a number of technologies available
today from vendors such as Akamai Technologies,
Microsoft, Adobe, and Google that can be used
to help protect content from the most common
threats to content being distributed over the
internet.
These mechanisms are designed to discourage
IP media security
and disable the ability to pirate content,
while at the same time allowing the content
owner to successfully monetise video assets whether through pay-per-view, rentals and
subscriptions, ad-supported, or other innovative
business models.
Some of these technologies include:
Token Authorisation. Token authorisation is a
method by which a “shared secret” is exchanged
and validated between the content provider’s web
infrastructure and the user (connecting from their
IP enabled device). This mechanism is typically
enabled to validate that the user has the rights to
access the content providers content. Token-based
authorisation mechanisms are commonly used
across the internet as a security mechanism to
validate user rights. To help confirm that only
authorised users get access to your video stream,
token authorisation security mechanism can be
used to provide a hybrid token scheme in which a
combination of a short TTL URL token and a
long TTL cookie-based token is used.
Player Verification. Player verification is
designed to prevent unauthorised players from
playing protected content. Because the video
player application can control much of the user
experience (eg, look and feel, playback
functionality, ad watching, and security features),
ensuring that the player is a valid and unaltered
one offers a high level of security against deep
linking attacks aimed at circumventing the
content provider’s business model. This security
mechanism is designed to ensure that a player
and resident AUTH module are authentic. This is
normally achieved by hashing the player and the
AUTH module to produce a message digest for
verification by the server managing the delivery of
the content. In addition, player verification can
also include a means by which to test the running
image for certain security code, and obfuscation
of the AUTH module.
Geo-fencing or content targeting. Geo-fencing/
content targeting enforces access control over
content in specific geographic regions. For
example, a content provider in Germany may
license a movie title from a major studio but is
restricted to only distributing that movie title in
the German market. Geo-fencing/ content
targeting technology enables that content provider
to restrict the consumption of that video to within
Germany.
Media Encryption. Media encryption is the
process of encoding video content in such a way
that hackers cannot read it, and ultimately rip the
content, but that authorised parties can. For
video delivery, media encryption can be applied
at multiple levels to protect content. For example,
a content provider may choose to only encrypt
the transport layer and not the content. For
added security the content provider may also
choose to encrypt the content itself, in addition to
the transport layer. One of the most powerful
implementation is the use of per session key
encryption. This means that every session request
for a video has its own unique encryption key.
Digital Rights Management. More commonly
referred to as DRM, this is a method used to
enforce and manage the distribution policies
for video. For example, a content provider
may only allow a video to be downloaded and
available for twenty-four hours after the download.
DRM would ensure that the copy of the video
would no longer be available after the twenty-four
hour period had expired. This scenario is
common in the digital video rental market.
DRM may also be leveraged to ensure that a
video may only be played on the device it has
been download to, and not available to transfer to
other playback devices.
The security mechanisms described above are
designed to provide content providers with tools
to help defend against the theft and unauthorised
use of their online video content across major
player run-times. Leveraging the technologies
above offers a multi-layer security approach,
which can be implemented in an easy and
scalable way that avoids end-user software
installation and maintenance hassle in most cases.
The streaming media security landscape is one
that will continue to evolve. As more and more
compelling content is made available online,
efforts to misappropriate and misuse the content
will increase as well, and content providers need
to arm themselves with best-of-breed solutions to
protect against those threats. Are you ready?
Stuart Cleary is EMEA product
director of Digital Media at
Akamai Technologies
www.csimagazine.com May-June 2013 41
DASH & HEVC
Industry divided on DASH
HEVC will flourish, but the same cannot be yet said of
MPEG-DASH streaming technology, discovers Goran Nastic
H
EVC and DASH enjoy
something of a symbiotic
relationship and are the two
big technology stories of
2013, both centring on IP
video. For the 70 or so
operators that have launched
multi-screen services, the challenge is one of having
to match consumer expectations of QoS versus
online delivery of content, which the two can
facilitate. But the two standards also seem to be
attracting some diverging thoughts on their
potential success in the face of increasing market
and device fragmentation.
Industry executives like to say, only halfjokingly, that the great thing about standards is
there are so many of them. In the case of DASH,
ironically, its overarching challenge is the
competition it faces from the very same adaptive
streaming protocols – namely Apple HLS, Adobe
HDS and Microsoft Smooth Streaming - it aims
to unify.
Primarily, this is due to a big shift in the last
few months towards HLS, which a number of
vendors CSI spoke to at the TV Connect show
highlighted was taking place. Broadcasters are
said to be implementing HLS to reach not just
iOS devices but also an increasing number of
other platforms, including Android. One executive
noted that, while he wasn’t allowed to disclose
exact figures, Sky numbers in terms of multiscreen video consumption are heavily skewed
towards iOS, partly attributable to the fragmented
Android space.
“Adobe has added HLS to HDS and they have
since then swung even harder towards the HLS
side. So that certainly is reducing some of the
players in that market for the protocols, while
Microsoft, although pushing DASH at one point,
have slowed a little in their support for it,” said
Nabil Kanaan, VP product management at RGB.
“So we find ourselves at this interesting
crossroads where HLS is gathering a lot more
momentum now more than ever before. So the
question is will the industry fall in line behind a
de facto standard or will the true standard efforts
42 May-June 2013
continue,” he said.
According to Kanaan, for the projects RGB is
involved in, any mention of DASH is usually a
case of customers wanting vendors that have a
DASH roadmap for fear of getting backed into a
corner, as opposed to any firm deployment plans.
Kanaan’s sentiments were echoed by Cisco’s
Nick Thexton, who doesn’t see the same driving
forces with DASH as there exist with HEVC. “We
don’t think that DASH is fundamentally a bad
standard but it feels like a forced measure. It
won’t be adopted as rapidly as HEVC but it does
have merit and it will be hard for another
standard to replace it,” said Thexton, adding that
the real issue DASH solves is that it thinks
carefully on power consumption on mobile
devices and spectrum utilisation.
By comparison, the HEVC market is “ready to
rip wide open,” according to Thexton, pointing to
a clear value proposition for OTT HD delivery
(high-def content can be pushed down broadband
networks at bitrates of 2-4Mbps) and no real
competition, citing Google’s proprietary VP8
codec as a recent example that has received
lukewarm support.
The other problem facing DASH is too many
fragmented profiles, which is causing extra
headaches, although the updated DASH-264 spec
has tried to fill some of these holes and the
overall technology standard is understood to be
stable enough that it won’t be broken in future.
Most argue that Apple has a big role to play
here in terms of iOS device support - there are
no smartphones or tablets that support DASH
as yet - but, again, the fact that things seem
to be moving towards HLS means that the
company has little to gain from migrating
to DASH TS or another variant.
“There are too many standards
www.csimagazine.com
and this won’t slow down.
DASH is just an umbrella
name for various protocols,
that covers a lot of different
sub sets,” said Lionel Bringuier, senior solutions
architect for EMEA at Elemental Technologies.
Bringuier hopes that maybe in the next two years
there will be a ‘Darwinian selection’ of protocols
and only the best will survive.
So it seems that despite the best efforts of
DASH, there won’t be one standard to rule them
all any time soon, with a co-existence period
existing between DASH and HLS for the next
couple of years at least.
HEVC, on the other hand, which offers at least
twice as much efficiency to MPEG-4, is seen as
unavoidable and is already coming along nicely,
illustrated by Orange’s decision to start HEVCbased VoD services to Samsung smart TVs in
France in March, as well as NTT DoCoMo’s
intent to launch one of the first smartphones
running on the new compression standard later
this year.
“HEVC is an immediate win for everybody,”
said Thexton, with development speed driven
mainly by economics, particularly the fact that
most extra complexity is in the encoding not
decoding, meaning that end-user devices will not
need significant extra processing power.
Set-top box lifecycles, however, mean that the
first HEVC capable STBs won’t happen until at
least 2015, driven by 4k/ultra HD services in the
broadcast world.
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Verimatrix specializes in securing and enhancing
revenue for multi-network, multi-screen digital TV
services around the globe. The award-winning
and independently audited Verimatrix Video
Content Authority System (VCAS™) and ViewRight®
solutions enable DVB cable, satellite, terrestrial,
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