Asia-Pacific Broadcasting (APB) March 2016 Volume 33, Issue 2

www.apb-news.com
NEWS & VIEWS
W O R L D I N B R I E F
Prasar Bharati trials
DVB-T2 services
NEW DELHI – Indian public
broadcasting agency Prasar
Bharati has started trial transmis-
sion of TV and radio channels
that can be accessed on smart-
phones. The DVB-T2 services
will interface with a dongle for
receipt of signals from a terres-
trial transmitter.
Netflix fully on the cloud
SAN FRANCISCO – Netflix has
completed its cloud migration
and shut down its last remain-
ing data centre. Having chosen
Amazon Web Services as cloud
provider, Yury Izrailevsky, VP,
Cloud and Platform Engineer-
ing, Netflix, wrote in a blog
posting that the elasticity of
the cloud has allowed Netflix to
add thousands of virtual servers
and petabytes of storage “within
minutes”.
High TV 4K launches
in India
LUCKNOW – High TV 4K, a new
international general entertain-
ment channel broadcasting in
4K/UHD, is launching in India via
media company Splendid Media.
Amit Srivastava, founder and
CEO of Splendid Media, said the
company will be tying up with
various local DTH and digital
cable providers to bring the 4K/
UHD experience across India.
5
NEWS & VIEWS
March 2016
6
CREATION
14
MANAGEMENT
20
DISTRIBUTION
| MARCH 2016
24
Aiming for open standards
and interoperability in IP
by shawn liew
WASHINGTON – Is the broadcast
industry’s transition to IP truly
gaining momentum … and what
will be key in ensuring that it does
not remain a pipe dream in the
near future?
For a newly formed independ-
ent trade association, the answer
to the former is a resounding yes;
promoting open standards and
interoperability aim to address
the latter.
The move to IP represents a
“massive shift” for the broadcast in-
dustry, with its importance height-
ened as business models change,
and the production and playout
components of the broadcast chain
experiences “huge technological
shift”, according to Tim Felstead,
head of product marketing at Snell
Advanced Media (SAM).
Felstead told APB: “True stand-
ardisation requires cooperation
under the auspices of a well-
❝ The road to IP needs to
X-PLATFORM
|
ISSUE 2
30
Top-grossing 2012 Australian feature
film The Sapphires is being made into
an animated TV series of the same
name.
The Sapphires
coming back –
as a cartoon
follow in the footsteps of SDI,
where standards currently
govern the consistent transport
of video and audio over PC
across all regions. ❞
— Steve Reynolds, CTO,
Imagine Communications
organised body, in order to create
an IP-based market where efficien-
cies on all sides can be achieved.
“There’s also, currently, confu-
sion on the customer side — and
we also need to provide clarity and
standards to address this. AIMS
is a very important effort in this
regard.”
The founding members of
AIMS, or Alliance for IP Media
Solutions, include SAM, Imagine
| VOLUME 33
Communications, Lawo, Grass Val-
ley and Nevion, and its ranks were
recently boosted with the addition
of Arista Networks, Cisco Systems,
EVS Broadcast Equipment and The
Telos Alliance.
One of AIMS’ key efforts will be
promoting the adoption, standard-
isation, development and refine-
ment of open protocols for media
over IP, with an initial emphasis
8 8
SYDNEY – Goalpost Pictures, an
Australian independent feature
film and TV drama producer, and
Sticky Pictures, a comedy produc-
tion house, are in the final stages
of development on The Sapphires,
an animated TV series based on
Goalpost Pictures’ successful fea-
ture film of the same name.
Developed with broadcaster
ABC TV Australia as a 26x22-
minute series, The Sapphires will
be aimed at kids aged 7-12 years.
Blending comedy and character-
driven drama with musical ele-
ments, the series follows Aboriginal
teenagers Gail, Cynthia, Julie and
Lay on their musical misadventures
in a fictional rural Australian town.
Netflix’s in Singapore – as a friend or foe?
SINGAPORE – Internet video streaming pro-
vider Netflix’s first call of business in Singapore
has been to announce partnerships with local
pay-TV operators StarHub and Singtel.
Available since January this year as a stan-
dalone over-the-top (OTT) service in Singapore,
Netflix will also be available in various guises, as
part of StarHub and Singtel’s pay-TV packages.
For StarHub, the partnership with Netflix is
a continuation of efforts to adapt to evolving
viewer needs, as Howie Lau, chief marketing
officer of StarHub, told APB: “Competition and
disruptive technologies are familiar challenges
to StarHub, as is the fact that customers always
have had access to multiple sources of enter-
tainment.
“To cater to the majority of viewers, an ope­
rator has to provide a comprehensive range of
content. In view of evolving viewing habits, we
have been enabling more content and offering
time-shifted options.
“Our partnership with Netflix is a testament
that we listen to what our customers want,
whether it is in content curation, viewing experi-
ence or customer service.”
These partnerships, however, do raise a
8 8
Li
v
e Vi
deo Acqui
si
t
i
on Sol
ut
i
ons f
or | Mobi
l
e News Cr
ews | Spor
t
s Br
oadcas
t
i
ng | News Vehi
cl
es | Vi
deo Jour
nal
i
s
t
s | Onl
i
ne St
r
eami
ng | Fi
r
s
t Res
ponder
s
Debut
i
ng t
he new I
deal Li
ve r
ent
al ser
vi
ce at
ABU Di
gi
t
al Symposi
um and Spor
t
el Asi
a 2016
Mar
k your cal
endar
s.
.
.
Meet
wi
t
h us
!