February 2013 www.tvbeurope.com


Viewers accept reduced image quality more readily than buffering, when the signal is poor


TVBEurope 37 The Workflow


Virgin Media bridges to OTT TV Anywhere


By Dave Wright, TV Operations 2nd Line support manager, Virgin Media


EARLY IN November 2012 Virgin Media launched its OTT TV Anywhere service. Rapidly scaling up to give access to the complete range of Virgin Media channels, the service is available free to existing subscribers viewing via computers, tablets and mobile devices. To fit the chosen business model, we needed to make the implementation as cost-effective as possible, but maintain the high quality of experience the viewer associates with the Virgin Media brand. There’s no doubt that mobile and desktop access to the full range of channels is a very popular additional service that customers really appreciate, but appreciation could quickly turn to irritation if the OTT service quality were to fall down.


Our strategy was to offer the


OTT service using adaptive streaming, with each stream provided in multiple bandwidths, for a seamless shift between bandwidths as the viewer’s conditions change. For example if a viewer


initially logs on to watch a channel with a good connection in a hotel lobby, but then moves up to his room where the signal is less strong, before walking out into the street while continuing to watch, our service is designed to provide a continuous experience. Buffering is minimised, and the system ‘shifts gear’ smoothly to cope with the variation in viewing conditions. Viewers accept reduced image quality more readily than buffering, when the


signal is poor. To monitor the new service we


looked at the available options on the market but it was not a difficult decision to choose Bridge Technologies. Virgin Media already has one of the largest Bridge Technologies installations in the world, and Bridge now offers a comprehensive OTT monitoring solution. If we had chosen a different


provider for our OTT monitoring it would have had a greater impact on our operation: more infrastructure, more screens in the control room, and a new set of tools to learn and support. By adding the Bridge OTT capability to our existing monitoring probes we made the upgrade process as smooth as it could possibly have been, and incorporated the OTT stream monitoring into our existing environment, which is completely familiar to all our staff by now. OTT capability is added to


the existing Bridgetech probes deployed through our system by a software licence. But to support the data volumes an


Dave Wright: Virgin Media already has one of the largest Bridge Technologies installations in the world


Virgin Media’s strategy was to offer the OTT service using adaptive streaming, with each stream provided in multiple bandwidths


headends, where VB220s can handle the load. The density that the VB330s deliver also tidies up the infrastructure in the main headends and makes infrastructure support and management easier. In operation, there’s no real difference between monitoring


dependent to a large degree on the content delivery network and the bandwidth provided to the viewer at any time. An OTT provider can’t control that, but by carefully managing and monitoring our adaptive streaming we make sure that the viewer has the best chance of an


place to add Smooth Streaming to cater for devices like Xbox. The technical infrastructure


for the OTT service spans many departments and there’s a lot of topology involved. But the introduction has been quite painless, and the easy integration of OTT monitoring


Indications so far are that the system is performing well, buffering is kept tightly under control and the adaptive streaming works to provide a robust service to OTT viewers


OTT service adds to the existing load, we also beefed up the core network with Bridgetech’s high- traffic VB330 probes. These offer a 10G architecture and this gives us the capacity to support the largest volumes where they occur, at our four core sites. We don’t need that 10G capacity at the 54 regional


one stream per viewer and eight. The system manages alarms intelligently and our overall management system consolidates information from a number of tools – of which the Bridgetech system is one – to give us an achievable workload. Quality of experience in an OTT service is of course


excellent quality of experience. As we develop the service, we


are increasing the number of viewing platforms supported. Currently the service is available in HLS and HDS for Apple mobile devices and desktop computers, as well as PCs, and will be extended for Android platforms. Plans are also in


with our existing cable service monitoring has contributed to this. Indications so far are that the system is performing well, buffering is kept tightly under control and the adaptive streaming works to provide a seamless and robust service to Virgin Media’s OTT viewers.


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