Sep 4 2013
Punto Sat, an Italian broadcaster, is now using VideoFlow's Digital Video Protection (DVP) technology to transport high quality, live content over the Internet.
DVP-10 and 100
"Our business relies on being able to deliver live content with no delays while providing the best quality viewing experience" explained Mr Andrea Bigi, CEO of Punto Sat. "The one-stop-shop approach of our system integrator Diem Technologies was compelling. Diem bundled VideoFlow's DVP with Ericsson's encoders and decoders to provide an easy-to-install solution. This solution has proven to be exceptionally reliable at delivering live content over the public Internet, which translates into a rapid return on our investment."
Simple networks lead to lower operational costs. "Now it is much easier to manage and control the network," said Mr Marco Tommasoni, Punto Sat's IT Manager. "If there is an issue, I simply log on from my smartphone or tablet to sort it out much faster than using the satellite network. I am no longer dependent on someone else to tell me what is happening. The in-band management gives direct access to all remote sites. VideoFlow's ETR290 stream analysers at both source and destinations provide exactly what is needed to determine if the issue is related to network problems or to transport stream problems. Bottom line, our customers receive higher quality of service simply because issues are resolved much faster."
The live content distribution network has its centre in Brescia where the content is distributed out using VideoFlow DVP to eight remote sites. This extremely flexible and scalable solution enables Punto Sat to add new locations very easily. Ericsson encoders (E5710) and decoders (RX8200) integrate with the VideoFlow DVP hardware to form a seamless solution.
Mrs. Ronit Kalujny, VideoFlow's CEO, added, "More and more companies are realising that legacy solutions for live content delivery no longer fit today's eco system, which is increasingly cost sensitive. Our DVP product line is the right solution for lowering costs without compromising quality. We make sure that packets are never lost as they transit the Internet and jitter is always eliminated. And we cut costs by using the Internet, not costly dedicated connections, giving customers a rapid ROI. Punto Sat has slashed its bill for content transport to just 90 Euros a day for Internet bandwidth."
VideoFlow technology
Live video broadcast are sent as a continuous bit stream, which the Internet was never designed to handle, resulting in artefacts caused by jitter, and packet loss. More than a couple of seconds of latency is unacceptable by customers expecting to enjoy the excitement of live events like sport as they happen. VideoFlow's patent pending technology opens the Internet for delivering content by ensuring that no packet is lost and nullifying the jitter caused by transiting the Internet. By doing so, it affords broadcasters, teleports and operators the opportunity to use a highly advanced, low cost solution for live, high quality video streams in place of existing, expensive solutions.
The DVP comes as a "Plug and Play" pair - a Protector, which stores the packets until it is certain that they have been correctly received, and a Sentinel which monitors the health of the video stream by watching for packet loss and requests packets to be resent from the Protector's cache only if required. This is ensured by VideoFlow's patents, which cover techniques to minimize the number of packets that have to be resent. VideoFlow's solution is highly flexible working with internet connections as slow as 200Kb/s or as fast as 800Mbps yet delivering the desired high quality. VideoFlow's patents also covers techniques to reduce bandwidth overhead to the minimum possible and to keep any delays at less than the two seconds, which is the maximum tolerated for true live broadcasts. VideoFlow's DVP family of products enables the reduction of bandwidth requirements cutting operational costs compared to the current solutions.
Video demo at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9ZjpjIlonU&feature=player_embedded