20 Saturday 14.09.13 theibcdaily The trick to product evaluation
Deciding what to buy isn’t as simple as it used to be, says Simen Frostad, chairman, Bridge Technologies
What does a woman want? This great conundrum has been addressed by thinkers from classical Greece, by Freud and his followers, by feminists and chauvinists, by fashion designers and marketing gurus. Did any of them come up with the right answer? Unlikely, because the
question rather ridiculously assumes that women all want the same thing. But it was fun to ask. What do broadcasters and
media organisations want? It might be easier to find an answer to that one, and it would probably be ‘success in extremely competitive conditions’, ‘profitability and growth’, or some variation on the theme. We can reduce the diversity of ‘what broadcasters want’ to a common factor because all broadcasters and media organisations face the same pressures, commercial and technical. So greater productivity,
lower operational costs, tighter integration – these goals are all
high on the list. Like a top professional cycling team, broadcasters are looking for gains – even marginal gains – in all areas because the sum of all those gains can be the difference between winning and losing. But there’s the rub. It’s more
difficult to evaluate a product’s ability to deliver greater productivity or tighter integration than it is to compare hard facts like bitrates or storage capacities. Productivity, integration and more efficient workflow are critical factors but they don’t exist in abstract, and can’t be defined in units on a specification. They can only really be assessed in the context of an organisation’s systems and infrastructures, personnel and working practices. To put it another way, it’s
difficult to tell how productive a new piece of kit can make your staff, until they’ve worked with it for some time and have really made it groove with their own preferences and the systems
around it – or found out that it doesn’t. This makes decision-making
about technology purchases much more demanding. There are still the fallback strategies that people use when they are struggling to understand complexity – buying on price, buying the ‘big name’ – but while these were once conservative strategies (‘nobody got sacked for buying Brand X’) they are not the way to achieve good value and optimum efficiency in the fiercely competitive media industry we have today. Buyers need to be more
discerning, question the status quo, and look for manufacturers that question it too. The tick-box approach is OK for checking off a list of required features, but it’s also vital to find out if those features are really worth having anyway, and if they are implemented in a way your personnel are going to find usable. And what about the features
you think you don’t need... at least not yet? Adaptability to
Simen Frostad ‘What does a woman want?’
evolving standards and trends is so important now that nobody can safely make a purchase decision that closes doors to the future. Almost any infrastructure
can be simplified and any working practice streamlined, when imagination and
technical innovation are combined in the right way. Laying the foundations for versatile, profitable media business is possible, but purchasers have to be smarter, better informed and more enquiring than ever before. 1.A30
Jean-François Leprince-Ringuet Q&A chief commercial officer, Eutelsat
Has IBC come at a good time for the electronic media industry? Why? Yes we’ve got lots to talk about at IBC. The satellite communications industry continues to be driven by fast growing digital markets in Russia, Middle East and Africa, booming HDTV growth in Europe, and the arrival of new technologies such as Ultra-HD. Eutelsat was the first operator
to launch an Ultra-HD demonstration channel which will be on show at IBC.
What do you think are the key developments in, or threats to, your market sector at the current time?
Connected TV is a key market development and consumer demand is soaring. Eutelsat has developed a ‘smart LNB’ for DTH reception, enabling
broadcasters to operate linear television and connected TV services directly by satellite. This revolutionary LNB has an embedded transmitter for interactive applications such as HbbTV, pay-per-view, social networking, personal
subscription management and live show participation.
Why should delegates visit your stand at IBC?
This year Eutelsat is celebrating 30 years of service from space, and 30 years of uninterrupted innovation! Visit our stand where we are showcasing our innovative ‘smart LNB’ as well as our latest solutions and resources to support customers, broadcasters, service providers, telecom operators and government agencies as they grow their business. 1.D59
Opinion
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