Tandberg Television’s operations are based on the progress of multimedia technology delivery methods. In the last year, the company has made notable steps in advanced compression systems, on-demand and content distribution solutions that are used by some of the world’s leading broadcasters, operators and programmers.
Tandberg closed 2008 with a series a series of impressive contract wins. SK Broadband, South Korea’s second largest broadband provider, chose to deploy Tandberg’s Television IPTV headend, which includes high-definition (HD) and standard-definition (SD) MPEG-4 AVC encoding. This solution will enable SK Broadband to launch linear broadcast television services in 2009 with 30 SD and 10 HD channels initially.
Tandberg kicked off 2009 with a content delivery deal with Starz Entertainment intended to promote Tandberg’s next-generation MediaPath system as a non-linear distribution platform. Lisa Hobbs, Tandberg’s vice president of business development is leading the charge to market MediaPath as a multimedia platform, capable of delivering voice and data over efficiently managed transmission streams.
Via Satellite spoke with Hobbs about the delivery system, the bandwidth capacity and efficiency issues that dominate conversations in broadcast sector, and the reality of a video content industry-wide transition from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4 compression.
VIA SATELLITE: It seems that you are pushing MediaPath as a multimedia content delivery system that goes beyond video, but your target customers are mostly video-on-demand providers. How do you plan on expanding beyond this market?
HOBBS: We are trying to make the market understand that while the next-generation MediaPath has, to date, been used solely for distribution of VOD (video-on-demand) content, any non-linear content can be distributed using that mechanism. Non-linear content includes advertising, music and games, which we are interested in distributing. The first system was very specifically geared toward cable VOD specifications. This system is much more open and we do want more customers and perspective customers to understand that if they have any type of non-linear content that needs to be distributed to many different locations, that MediaPath is in fact, a viable option for them.
VIA SATELLITE: Does Tandberg have the bandwidth capacity to manage all of this content?
HOBBS: Our plans to roll out with a diverse content distribution platform centers on how efficiently the company manages its bandwidth. Tandberg is managing satellite transmissions with a two-fold solution that yields 20 percent to 30 percent more bandwidth efficiency. The first part of that system is DVB-S2 modulation technology, which not only allows for more bits to be packed into the same bandwidth but also creates increased margins on the satellite link. If our customers have been operating on the edge of a satellite link, they can give themselves more of a buffer to make sure they maintain their signals.
The second part of the system is an optional add-on dubbed Prekor, a digital pre-correction technology. When you just use DVB-S2 technology, and especially if you use the higher-order modulation schemes, what you end up finding is that there are distortions on the satellite transponder. Non-linearity is then introduced to the transmission. Those non-linearities can translate into a reduction in the amount of bits available for use. So we can linearize the transponder for the transmissions as a digital pre-correction. It is something that is only done on the uplink. It doesn’t impact any downlink receiver at all and also adds to the increased efficiency of the transmission.
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