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OTT: A
necessary evil?
All broadcasters see it as a necessity to
run catch-up and back-catalogue OTT
VoD services, but they are a cost centre
and show little sign of making money.
Can OTT become a profit centre for any
but the mega international providers?
ome question the business
model of OTT leviathans such as
Netflix; can growth powered by
the undercutting of pay-TV
subscriptions and the provision of
expensive content be sustained? But no
one doubts the expense for
broadcasters of OTT and the difficulty
of recovering that cost. AdvancedTelevision gathered seven top OTT
practitioners in London to debate the
issues.
“Broadcasters are certainly now looking to
monetize catch-up. I think ‘traditional
broadcasters’ are going to be going on the
attack by adapting their offering and, with a
hybrid approach, making it more of a
blended service,” says Ian Trow, senior
director of emerging technology, Harmonic.
“Yes, I think there’s a lot of untapped
resource; broadcasters have huge archives
they can make available, so I think there is a
‘fight-back’,” agrees James Kirby, director of
solutions architecture at Edgeware.
“But Tier 2 or 3 content will never attract
a premium,” declares Dr. Glodina Connan-
S
Lostanlen, V