22 TVBEurope Round Table
www.tvbeurope.com November 2012 In association with
Fergal Ringrose, editorial director,TVBEurope, opened the day’s proceedings with a welcome message
Looking at viewing habits,
how does an organisation like Grass Valley help organisations like Sky, ITV and Viacom International Media Networks to deliver, implement, select and consult with these services and projects?
Negus highlighted that one single organisation doesn’t have all the necessary answers. “The industry is evolving at a quick rate. You just need to look at the consumer devices that are driving this change in terms of access. For instance, during the Olympics there were over 12 million people on mobile devices getting video streams from online sources. Out of that, a proportion were tablet users but the majority were on smartphones. The organisations driving that sort of technology take-up are the likes of Microsoft, Google, Apple and IBM and HP in the background, and the amount of money they’re spending to advance that is significant. We need to constantly refine — where we play and where we can help out customers and partners focusing on the areas where Grass Valley is strong and trying to leverage what is out there.
“Our mantra is that the same technology that is driving this choice in the marketplace is the same technology that can potentially solve the problem for us and our partners. Work with the likes of Microsoft so they do what they do best and we’ll layer our capabilities on top of that.”
Gary Negus:“What we can do is provide them with the tools so that they can reach different customers in a variety of different ways. Ultimately content is what drives the acquisition”
media? Very. How important is IT to the consumer? Very and it’s at that convergence point that Grass Valley can start to add some value. How do consumers engage with IT? How do consumers engage with media and IT? And how do we give the tools to our creative
are also trying to occupy the mindspace of the consumer. People aren’t going to change,
according to Ioannou. “I think it’s still going to be flexibility and choice. The role companies like Grass Valley can play is preserving the production process. Preserving the whole
“We’re realising that people are finding it very hard to locate content. Certainly with time-shifted content as well and on demand services, it’s starting to get very difficult. This is one area that we’re focused on”
The discussion moved on
when Bancroft posed the question of how important broadcasters are to IT? Bertioli said from the manufacturers point of view a lot more money is spent on R&D and software than it used to be spent on hardware. “A lot of the hardware is standard IT hardware.” Negus rephrased the question to ask “how important is IT to
Transporting content
Quoting research by IHS Screen Digest, Bancroft revealed that OTT delivery costs for SD TV over a Content Delivery Network exceed those of satellite distribution for audiences of over 8,000. He asked the broadcasters if they
had looked at this from a business perspective?
Long said it depends on the service that is being offered OTT. “If it has a DRM system then yes absolutely. You’re probably paying a third party a distribution cost per subscriber, so of course
that will work out more expensive. But if you’re providing a complementary service which is accessed via the internet and using your own proprietary systems then no, it’s not.” Ioannou felt it was a
statement that is not a ‘one fit
all’. “How does that stack up against other ways of delivering DTT?” “It all depends on your
transport of that particular content,” added Long. Grass Valley’s Negus suggested turning that statement
around. “If you want to reach a niche market of less than 8,000 users it’s cheaper to do it over a unicast scenario than it is over a traditional broadcast platform. It’s finding the right way of reaching the right audience size.” — Melanie Dayasena-Lowe
customers? We’re not going to tell Sky, ITV or Viacom International Media Networks how to run TV channels. What we can do however is provide them with the tools so that they can reach different customers in a variety of different ways. Ultimately content is what drives the acquisition.” Bancroft asked why the consumer still wants to go to the broadcaster? For example, telcos
Darren Long, Sky Sports
package from start to finish, that’s how we make content available. Why wouldn’t you put your content on any platform?” Commenting on an Ericsson ConsumerLab study last year, Bancroft cited that the consumption of TV and video is already greater on non-TV devices than on conventional TV screens. Long believes it’s all down to the type of content. “Movies
are going to time-shift because actually we want that on demand along with children’s programmes and entertainment. But news, sport and others people want to watch when it happens. It’s all about choice and the right appropriate device for the right appropriate medium.” “By the middle of 2011 [when the ConsumerLab study was conducted] it was quite difficult for me to watch ITV Player, 4oD, Demand 5 or iPlayer on my big screen. By February next year when they are all on the Sky+ platform, it’s going to be a piece of cake. There’s no thinking involved. It’s going to turn around and come back to the big screen,” commented Robert Hesmondhalgh of Grass Valley. When talking about events- based TV, there are going to be more ways for people to interact, said Negus. “Whether for news or TV, there are common aspects of what you need to do to that content to get it to air, be it on a tablet, smartphone or big screen TV. “An area of our focus is to put software-based tools on to
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