Globecomm offers delegates peek into new media processing centre

Scott Christner, Globecomm’s business development director, gave conference delegates at BroadcastAsia 09 a sneak peak into the ‘new media’ processing centre of the future citing India’s Bharti Airtel Media Processing Centre as a case study.

“In today’s competitive video delivery environment, the new service provider must be able to provide more than just the classic TV service. A platform is now required to offer both quality content and applications that differentiate the service over and above the competition and, in turn, revolutionises the way television is viewed by the consumer,” said Christner

He added: “The IP-Centric Media Processing Centre presents the service provider with a cost effective and flexible platform that can deliver any combination of multi-media services. This centralised service platform comes complete with ingest, processing, encoding/transcoding, digital rights management, transports and overall network management functions.”

Christner's presentation described how an Asian mobile carrier capitalised on the explosive growth opportunity for video by creating an advanced Media Processing Centre (MPC) capable of handling multiple formats and configurations of mobile devices as well as standard DTH, cable and over-the-air broadcast.

Market research forecasts that by 2013 manufacturers will have sold nearly 2 billion devices capable of viewing IP video over 3G networks. Already, the explosive growth of the iPhone is changing the viewing habits of owners. Sixty-three percent of iPhone users have watched video on the device, compared with 28 per cent of other mobile users.

Christner showcased the design, integration and start-up of the MPC that began service in 2008 and suggested successful implementation techniques and pitfalls to avoid.

He said a properly-designed MPC should ingest video and audio content in any form and have the capability to distribute it not only over mobile networks but also via satellite, cable and fiber in both scheduled and on-demand modes.

Globecomm Systems Inc. provides products and services including pre-engineered systems, systems design and integration services, managed network services and life cycle support services. Globecomm also offers end-to-end value-added satellite-based communication products, services and solutions by leveraging its core satellite ground segment systems and network capabilities, with its satellite communication services capabilities.