Archive for the ‘Video’ Category

New Akamai ad integration services for online video advertising

Friday, February 22nd, 2013

The addition to Akamai’s Sola Vision Portfolio performs dynamic insertion of targeted advertisements into video streams across Internet-connected devices.

The Cloud-based solution is designed to meet the scalability challenge to reach the largest online audiences.

New Akamai Ad Integration Services bring higher quality and simplicity to online video advertising.

New Akamai Ad Integration Services bring higher quality and simplicity to online video advertising.

The newest offering in Akamai’s cloud-based Sola Vision suite of workflow, security, and connectivity solutions, Ad Integration Services is designed to simplify the insertion of individually-targeted advertising video content into video streams without the potential quality degradation inherent in a client-based approach.

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New Hard Disk Drive: Seagate Video 2.5 HDD for greater reliability and energy efficiency

Monday, December 17th, 2012

The Seagate Video 2.5 HDD is a 2.5-inch drive specifically engineered for use in 24/7 video applications like digital video recorders (DVRs), set-top boxes (STBs), and surveillance applications.

New Seagate Video 2.5 HDD for greater reliability and energy efficiency.

New Seagate Video 2.5 HDD for greater reliability and energy efficiency.

The Video 2.5 HDD targets three key areas of importance to manufacturers – high reliability, acoustics, and energy efficiency.

For reliability, the drive has an annual failure rate of approximately 0.55, based on current configurations, enabling it to keep product in the field longer while reducing the cost of field deployment and maintaining customer retention.

“We pioneered the HDD video market more than a decade ago and as such are leveraging our vast knowledge of this technology to bring consumers the most reliable video drive in the world,” said Scott Horn, Seagate vice president of Marketing.

It boasts 24/7 operation capabilities in extended temperature ranges and enhanced acoustics for near silent operation — features crucial for consumer electronics and video applications.

The Video 2.5 HDD provides home entertainment manufacturers one and two disk, cost-optimized solutions for today’s high-definition (HD) video recording applications.

Featuring capacities up to 500 GB, manufacturers can benefit from its lower-power performance and slim form factor without sacrificing the streaming capabilities or reliability of Seagate’s 3.5-inch video drive.

Its low power consumption, 24×7 operation, and support of up to 12 streams of simultaneous HD content also make it ideal for surveillance DVR applications.

“The CE industry has extremely specific criteria and needs when it comes to storage and the Video 2.5 HDD is built to meet and exceed their rigorous demands,” added Horn.

The living-room environment requires superior acoustic management to limit audible distractions during operation of DVRs and STBs and the Video 2.5 HDD enables designers to build the quietest home entertainment systems possible.

Operating below the range of audible sound for the human ear at just 22db, the drive provides optimised acoustics for home entertainment components.

Compared to 3.5-inch HDDs

The drive reduces packaging materials by 53 percent and overall freight by up to 30 percent – over previous 3.5-inch offerings – by efficiently packing and shipping more units with fewer materials than larger drives.

The Seagate Video 2.5 HDD is designed specially for video.

The Seagate Video 2.5 HDD is designed specially for video.

It also contributes to sustainable energy initiatives by achieving a 55 percent improvement in power savings over comparable 3.5-inch offerings, enabling system integrators to meet aggressive new energy requirements.

Encompass celebrates launch of 100th channel from Singapore facility

Thursday, November 8th, 2012

Encompass Digital Media now has the largest independent playout and Teleport facility in Asia, boosting Singapore’s goal to become a global media hub.

Encompass Digital Media has 24/7/365 Teleport facilities and technical personnel in USA, UK and Singapore.

Encompass Digital Media has 24/7/365 Teleport facilities and technical personnel in USA, UK and Singapore.

Encompass had aimed to reach the 100-channel (from Singapore) origination/transmission milestone in 24 months. Instead it achieved the target six months earlier – within 18 months.

“Over the next few months, we plan to add seven more channels, making it easier for content owners to expand their reach into Asia on multiple platforms,” divulged Deepakjit Singh, managing director for Encompass Asia.

In the last 12 months, it has launched one channel every three weeks.

In a climate when players in the industry are folding or struggling with difficult economic outlooks, Deepakjit Singh is brimming with confidence that Encompass will “ride the wave” of growth through its aggressive embracing of digitalisation.

Deepakjit is the Managing Director of Asia for Encompass Digital Media, one of the world’s top digital media services providers and a leader in global satellite and terrestrial connectivity.

“Providing our clients with the ability to expand their business models and further monetize their assets through the vast range of innovative services we offer is what differentiates us from our competitors,” said Deepakjit.

The company’s mission-critical media services provides broadcasters, cable networks, corporations and government agencies with customized solutions for the management and distribution of content globally.

Currently, the Singapore facilities is capable of supporting up to 250 channels, but the constant upgrading of infrastructure ensures that it will always have more than enough capacity to cater to rapid growth.

Encompass is investing US$20 million over five years into its Singapore operations for technology and infrastructure upgrading, employee up-skilling and community engagement initiatives.

Almost half of that has already been invested on technology upgrading in order to increase productivity and to reduce the marginal cost of launching a new channel.

This enables Singapore to compete effectively with China and India.

In the last two years, the number of channels that Encompass Asia provides end-to-end services to has increased threefold.

About Encompass Asia

Encompass Asia is a leading provider of content management and distribution services with more than 30 per cent share in the market.

“People in Asian countries like Vietnam, India and China, are becoming increasingly mobile and are demanding for content in different languages and formats,” observed Deepakjit.

“At our Singapore facility, we have the capability to convert content into over 200 formats for nearly every type of platform and delivery model.”

In Singapore, Encompass Asia have the largest digital media facility in the region from where content is played out to the rest of Asia, reaching as far as South Korea, Japan, New Zealand and India.

The 88,000 sq. ft. facility with 16 satellite uplinks is designed to offer a robust, redundant infrastructure providing playout, distribution, digital media manipulation, creative, technical and global archival services.

In addition, the facility also houses a cutting-edge post-production operation and production studio giving its clients an end-to-end solution when creating and delivering content.

Its parent, Encompass Digital Media has 24/7/365 Teleport facilities and technical personnel in USA, UK and Singapore.

Polycom gains significant market share 1H 2012

Tuesday, September 11th, 2012

Polycom gains significant market share in the global video collaboration market in both Q1 and Q2 to gain an additional 8 percent of the total market in 1H 2012, controlling roughly one-third of the market.

Polycom has taken an additional 8% of the global video collaboration market over the past half a year to control roughly one-third of the market.

Polycom has taken an additional 8% of the global video collaboration market over the past half a year to control roughly one-third of the market.

Polycom has announced significant, sequential quarter-over-quarter market share gains in the video collaboration industry for the first half of 2012, at the cost of some of its biggest competitors.

According to new quarterly market share research reports from IDC, Synergy Research Group and Wainhouse Research, Polycom gained between 4.4 and 5.7 percentage points in revenue market share quarter-over-quarter in Q2 2012.

Based on reports from all three firms, Polycom’s Q2 gains build on the company’s market share gains of up to 2.2 percent in the first quarter of the year.

Polycom has gained an additional 8 percent of the total market in 1H 2012, controlling roughly one-third of the market.

On the whole, Polycom now holds more than 32 percent global market share at the end of the second quarter of 2012, and gained nearly 8 percent global video collaboration market share in the first half of 2012, reports Wainhouse Research.

Forrester ranks Polycom top for video collaboration

Wednesday, August 22nd, 2012

In a new independent report from Forrester Research, Polycom has been ranked top for video collaboration strategy and current offerings.

Cisco was ranked a close second while Huawei was out of the top three.

The Forrester Wave: Room-Based Videoconferencing, Q3 2012 Report

The Forrester Wave: Room-Based Videoconferencing, Q3 2012 Report

Polycom received perfect scores in the categories of quality of experience, interoperability, product roadmap, partnerships, security and compliance.

“Polycom has a diverse portfolio of endpoints including a range of options that run the gamut from mobile and room-based systems to immersive telepresence,” wrote Phillip Karcher, the author of the Forrester Research report.

Polycom is a global leader in open standards-based unified communications (UC), with a global ecosystem of over 7,000 partners.

The report, titled “The Forrester Wave: Room-Based Videoconferencing, Q3 2012”, uses 39 criteria to evaluate the top vendors in the industry, looking at video collaboration solutions for every work environment – from mobile and desktops to room systems and immersive telepresence – along with the services that support them.

The Forrester Wave report also discusses the growing interest in “face to face” video collaboration, which is helping businesses increase productivity, improve employee engagement and trust and lower costs.

“Polycom will also continue to offer the industry’s broadest multi-vendor integration and lowest TCO. For our more than 415,000 customers globally, Polycom is delivering innovations in video collaboration that are changing the way people work, collaborate, learn, govern, create and even help save lives,” said Andy Miller, CEO Polycom.

Polycom RealPresence video collaboration solutions deliver secure, high-quality video to companies of all sizes, so that teams can meet face-to-face with colleagues, partners and customers anywhere people work ― in the office, at home, on the go, or on the manufacturing floor, in a hospital or, at a movie set.

The RealPresence Platform provides the robust provisioning, management, scalability, reliability, flexibility and security required both for video enterprises and their private video clouds serving thousands of users, as well as for Video-as-a-Service (VaaS) delivered from the cloud potentially to tens of millions.

Read more about the Polycom RealPresence Video Collaboration Solutions below.

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Video conferencing from Vidyo

Thursday, June 21st, 2012

During CommunicAsia2012, I took a look at the telepresence solutions provided by Vidyo.

They offer at affordable prices full telepresence solutions with 9 screens to soft-client applications that allow individuals to join a video conference session via their personal smartphone, tablet, notebook or desktop computer.

VidyoPanorama set up with six screens, two of which are used to share data/slides. The thin console at the bottom is the VidyoRouter.

VidyoPanorama set up with six screens, two of which are used to share data/slides. The thin console at the bottom is the VidyoRouter.

Vidyo is a US-based company that offers personal and mobile telepresence solutions for individuals and telepresence solutions for enterprises.

Marty Hollander, Senior Vice President, Market Development at Vidyo. Here he's showing VidyoMobile on an iPad endpoint.

Marty Hollander, Senior Vice President, Market Development at Vidyo. Here he's showing VidyoMobile on an iPad endpoint.

Many systems on the market today require an initial cost of $150k for a 3-screen dedicated room with an ongoing monthly fee of $10k per month.

Using these systems, a 3-hour video conferencing call from three sites could cost $3,600,

Vidyo claims its solutions would cost only a fraction – in most cases only a tenth.

It does this by controlling access and delivery with innovative components that turn ordinary IP networks into sophisticated yet affordable video communication systems.

The infrastructure that enables this comprise the VidyoRouter, VidyoPortal, VidyoGateway and VidyoReplay.

The conferencing endpoints, on the other hand, consists of VidyoMobile, VidyoDesktop, Vidyo Executive Desktop, VidyoRoom and VidyoPanorama.

A maximum 9-screen VidyoPanorama room setup, together with VidyoMobile clients (Android and iOS smartphones and tablets), and VidyoDesktop on a 1440p Mac monitor.

A maximum 9-screen VidyoPanorama room setup, together with VidyoMobile clients (Android and iOS smartphones and tablets), and VidyoDesktop on a 1440p Mac monitor.

You can find details of each of the above components in the brochure that I’ve attached at the end of this post.

Vidyo had the VidyoPanorama (with 6 monitors) system and VidyoMobile/VidyoDesktop clients set up to show how it works and the performance and latency (or lack of) involved.

They had temps manning some of the endpoints so that visitors like myself could video-conference with them.

The performance was pretty good. Resolution was good and there wasn’t any noticeable latency.

I like the patented Adaptive Video Layering technology underpinning the solutions.

Essentially, the VidyoRouters dynamically optimises the video stream for each endpoint based on its capabilities and its local network conditions and bandwidth.

H.264 Scalable Video Coding (SVC)-based compression technology and Vidyo’s Adaptive Video Layering removes the need for transcoding by the Multipoint Control Unit (MCU) in traditional systems, offering high error resilience and low latency rates over the Internet, LTE and 4G networks.

This allows VidyoPanorama to connect over low-cost broadband networks with participants from any location.

The optional VidyoGateway extends the solution to existing H.323 and SIP endpoints; and clients using other videoconferencing systems – such as those from Cisco or Polycom.

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Microsoft and Tata Communications join OVCC

Tuesday, May 1st, 2012

Microsoft Corp, Tata Communications, ACT Conferencing, and Kathea have joined the Open Visual Communications Consortium (OVCC).

Official website of the Open Visual Communications Consortium (OVCC).
The OVCC is a group of leading service and solution providers creating the blueprint to deliver high-quality video collaboration that connects any vendor, any network and any device, anywhere.

Six months after the launch of the OVCC in October 2011, there are now 23 members in the independent group.

OVCC members contribute to and implement the OVCC technical and commercial blueprint, using established standards and best practices to accelerate and commercialize business-to-business video communications.

OVCC members are committed to providing video around the world to enable enterprise users to place and receive video calls beyond corporate firewalls and across standards-based and proprietary video platforms.

The first OVCC services are scheduled to launch later this year.

Service providers will develop and implement OVCC technical and commercial specifications based on industry standards, best practices and business approaches to answer the need for interconnection, addressing, signaling, interoperability and service coordination.

Interoperable, high-quality connectivity across networks and devices should allow network providers to profitably and predictably monetize their inter-enterprise video exchanges.

By making interoperability requirements invisible to the enterprise, the OVCC specification enables enterprise users to leverage video conferencing investments and enable more efficient value chains – spanning customers, distributors and suppliers – to improve the speed and efficiency of doing business.

Video collaboration stakeholders interested in closing video connectivity gaps can meet OVCC members in person at TIA in Dallas, Texas, June 5-7, or at CommunicAsia in Singapore, June 19-22.

Nelson Mandela Digital Archive goes live online

Wednesday, March 28th, 2012

Google and the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory (NMCM) have launched archive.nelsonmandela.org which is freely accessible to the public.

The archives include never-seen sequel manuscripts to Mandela’s “Long Walk to Freedom” autobiography.

We should never allow ourselves to forget the struggles for such basic rights as racial equality and take racial harmony for granted.

We should never allow ourselves to forget the struggles for such basic rights as racial equality and take racial harmony for granted.

When I was a youth, everybody knew who Nelson Mandela was and Apartheid was a must-study topic for the General Paper exam in school.

I wonder how many of the current generation remember or know about the tumultuous struggles in South Africa to fight for what many in the rest of the world take for granted – racial equality.

Even today in Singapore, you have people posting insensitive remarks about other races and nationalities over Twitter.

And in the US, the Trayvon Martin shooting is still brewing over.

In order to keep the memories of Nelson Mandela alive, Google gave a US$1.25m grant to Johannesburg-based NMCM last year.

The aim was to preserve and digitize thousands of archival documents, photographs and videos about Mr Mandela.

The new online multimedia archive includes Mr Mandela’s correspondence with  family, comrades and friends, diaries written during his 27 years of imprisonment, and notes he made while leading the negotiations that ended apartheid in South Africa.

Start by looking at his Early Life, and take a peek into his personal memories of the time he was incarcerated during the Prison Years.

Read the handwritten notes on his desk calendars, which show, for example, that he met President F.W. De Klerk for the first time on December 13, 1989 for two and a half hours in prison; the Warrants of Committal issued by the Supreme Court which sent him to prison; the earliest known photo of Nelson Mandela’s prison cell on Robben Island circa 1971; and a personal letter written from prison in 1963 to his daughters, Zeni and Zindzi, after their mother was arrested, complete with transcript.

What was Apartheid

Apartheid was the official policy of the National Party, which came to power in 1948 in South Africa. It was the practice of official racial segregation.

Under apartheid everyone in South Africa had to be classified according to a particular racial group.

This determined where someone could be born, where they could live, where they could go to school, where they could work, where they could be treated if they were sick and where they could be buried when they died.

Only white people could vote and they had the best opportunities and the most money spent on their facilities.

Apartheid made others live in poverty.

Black South Africans’ lives were strictly controlled.

Many thousands of people died in the struggle to end apartheid.

– www.nelsonmandela.org/content/page/faqs

Telecom industry leaders join forces to form Global Meeting Alliance

Wednesday, February 1st, 2012

Tata Communications and nine other telecom leaders (including Telstra and Sprint) pledge their commitment today to interconnect their business video communities – driving global cross-network collaboration.

Tata Communications and nine other telecom leaders form Global Meeting Alliance

Tata Communications and nine other telecom leaders form Global Meeting Alliance

The Global Meeting Alliance is an open ecosystem that allows any service provider to connect to enterprises and institutions on all major continents, irrespective of carrier, following a similar business model to the airline alliance networks.

Peter Quinlan, Vice President, Integrated Business Video Services, Tata Communications, highlighted his company’s commitment towards “… facilitating an open, global ecosystem that moves business video from an intracompany experience to a collaboration tool with worldwide reach.”The community aims to solve shared-industry challenges to make business video available globally, simple to connect, and affordable for all.

The launch represents the largest functioning global collaboration between service providers in business video services.

Launch members include Safaricom in Africa, Telstra in Australia, Etisalat, Qtel and Mobily in the Middle East, Neotel in South Africa and Sprint, Glowpoint and TELUS in North America.

Leveraging Tata Communications’ large number of intercarrier agreements, customers of the Global Meeting Alliance members now have access to an international Telepresence network of 3rd party video endpoints, as well as the largest global public Telepresence room network consisting of 40 public Telepresence suites in 20 countries.

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Apple updates Final Cut Pro X

Tuesday, January 31st, 2012

Apple today released Final Cut Pro X v10.0.3, a significant update to its professional video editing application. The free update is available from the Mac App Store.

Apple updates Final Cut Pro X to v10.0.3

Apple updates Final Cut Pro X to v10.0.3

Final Cut Pro X v10.0.3 is available from the Mac App Store for SGD$299.99 (incl. GST) to new users, or as a free update for existing Final Cut Pro X customers.

The update introduces the following main features:

  • Multicam editing that automatically syncs up to 64 angles of video and photos.
  • Advanced chroma keying for handling complex adjustments right in the app.
  • Enhanced XML for a richer interchange with third party apps and plug-ins that support the fast growing Final Cut Pro X ecosystem.
  • Beta of broadcast monitoring that supports Thunderbolt devices as well as PCIe cards.

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