Q. What do you anticipate will be the most significant technology trend at the 2015 NAB Show?
A. We are living in a mobile-enabled world in which content providers are looking to create, deliver and monetize more content than ever before across a myriad of consumer end-point devices. The media broadcast industry is at an inflection point—an exciting transformation—and content providers are quickly taking interest in transitioning away from legacy systems and proprietary hardware to IP-enabled, software-defined and cloud-virtualized environments, which provide the freedom to grow, change and adapt. We have been a leader in this inevitable industry transition for a while now.
Going into the NAB Show, technology advances have accelerated the prospect of handling all content over an IP network, and we will see increased use of standard, commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) IT hardware for many broadcast network functions. Because COTS hardware is less expensive, can be worked harder and no longer requires as much expensive rack space, floor space, power and cooling, it enables greater efficiencies and huge cost savings. Once we can implement everything in software, it becomes much more efficient.
Q. What will be your most important product news?
A. While it is too early to announce specifics, going into the NAB Show we will be releasing details of our end-to-end, cloud-based video delivery platform, which includes Just-In-Time packaging, Cloud DVR and Dynamic Ad Insertion (DAI) capabilities. We will unveil some exciting partnership news with some of the world’s leading technology companies that will enable us to better serve our customers’ software-defined, cloud-virtualized and IP-enabled framework requirements.
Building on the momentum we gained at IBC last year, where we introduced the industry’s first IP-enabled cloud playout solution, VersioCloud, we have continued to cloud-enable more of our solutions to provide customers with greater control and flexibility over their operations. Some of these solutions will be announced closer to the show, along with some truly groundbreaking customer implementations. You can also expect to hear about new additions to our line of dense and powerful Platinum routers, as well HEVC enhancements to our multiscreen encoding platform.
To see some of these exciting new capabilities and more, visit Imagine Communications on the show floor in Booth N2702 (or RGB Networks, Booth N1919).
Q. How is your new product different from what’s available on the market?
A. While a number of à la carte services have been developed that enable consumers to watch television content on time-shifted schedules through DVR, Catch-Up or VoD services, or across fixed and mobile devices—a common, next-generation cloud delivery platform has yet to emerge in the market. Among other things, Imagine Communications will be discussing the consumer experience of tomorrow, and how new solutions being introduced and demonstrated at the show support this vision for a single-vendor, multiscreen cloud video distribution platform.
Q. What is it about the NAB Show that brings you back every year?
A. The NAB Show is unrivaled in its ability to bring together the world’s leading media companies, thought leaders and decision makers in one place for collaboration and discussion around the challenges and rapid transformations that are taking place across the media broadcast industry. Through live demonstrations of our latest innovations and end-to-end solutions, we are able to showcase in person investments that support our vision of a future defined by software, TV Everywhere, the cloud and IP, and how this vision will enable customers to create, deliver and monetize content.
Often, the first-ever global demonstration of our new products or solutions takes place at the NAB Show, giving customers and partners unique access and insight into our work. Last year at the show we announced a strategic acquisition that, along with our existing portfolio, allowed us to provide the industry with the most robust TV Everywhere solution available. We also announced a strategic partnership with IBM to bring our complete playout, automation and TV Everywhere solution to the cloud. We look forward to continuing the momentum at the NAB Show this year.
