Cisco is becoming an increasingly important player on the video services landscape. The company signalled its intentions earlier this year when it unveiled its Videoscape services, a TV platform for service providers that aims to combine digital TV and online content with social media and communications applications.
Enrique Rodriguez, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Service Provider Video Technology Group, is responsible for more than $2 billion in revenue and leading Cisco’s strategic direction in the area of next-generation video services. He discusses the launch of Videoscape and how Cisco can work with the satellite sector.
VIA SATELLITE: When do you see the first deployment of Videoscape?
Rodriguez: I expect some early deployments in the next 12 months, but I think Videoscape will really start showing up in 2012. I think we could see some showcase partnership deals signed this year. I think this year will be a good indicator. You will see some key partnership deals with a view to an actual time of deployment.
VIA SATELLITE: What does Videoscape bring to the market that has not been available before?
Rodriguez: With Videoscape, what we are doing is taking television delivery and turning it into an application in the broad IP network so a service provider can focus all of their capital in improving their core network. A typical service provider today is likely to have both a wireline and wireless infrastructure. The reality is you want to keep investing your capital infrastructure dollars to make that infrastructure better and better so you can start to think about the applications on top of that.
The philosophy based around this is that TV and video are perhaps the most demanding applications out there, but, nevertheless, they are just applications, and they are IP. We need to move things forward so service providers do not the feel the need to build parallel networks as they are delivering video services. That is the big philosophy behind Videoscape. You can make an analogy in terms of what happened with voice services. Over time, if you wanted to improve your voice network, you wanted to buy voice network equipment. A service provider thinks of voice as an application on an IP network. We see a future in video just like that.
VIA SATELLITE: How does Cisco view the over-the-top (OTT) TV market?
Rodriguez: It is still a very nascent aspect of the industry and we are still seeing it evolve. I think what we are seeing from the last two years is that OTT is currently moving in two interesting divergent paths. On the one hand, you have media companies such as broadcasters that are using the Internet and broadband to bring to their consumer a direct product. It is not a package with a service provider offering a range of services. They are looking to go beyond the PC and onto the iPad or smartphones. The other aspect of this is the new cellular and broadband technologies that allow the service providers to extend their service to consumers beyond the traditional footprint. If a service provider is in x million homes, using OTT technologies, they can then provide services to those customers even when those customers are not at their home. OTT used to mean riding on top of the service provider, but actually we are seeing a lot more interest from the service provider themselves riding on top of other service providers.
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