Cisco at IBC 2009: Cisco Customers Demonstrate How Medianets Are Transforming the Video Experience

IBC 2009, Amsterdam
Stand D71, Hall 1

AMSTERDAM - The growth in Internet Protocol (IP)-based video delivery continues to generate opportunity in a highly competitive industry, spurring service providers to accelerate their transformation to “experience providers”. The recent Cisco® Visual Networking Index IP traffic forecast study estimates that video (including TV, video on demand, Internet, and peer-to-peer transmissions) will account for more than 91 percent of global consumer Internet traffic by 2013.

The delivery of optimal video experiences will rely on medianets, IP next-generation networks optimised for rich media. The intelligent, media-aware, network-aware and device-aware capabilities of medianets address the key components that drive profitability for experience providers: minimising capital and operating expenses while increasing revenue through more efficient monetisation and new revenue streams from differentiated services.

At IBC this year, the evidence from Cisco customers demonstrates how medianet technology is helping experience providers manage the complexity and scale of video delivery to ensure quality of service for the end user.
Customer Highlights

Virgin Media, a leading entertainment and communications company in the UK, has chosen Cisco to support its TV distribution platform and help upgrade its legacy digital TV infrastructure. Virgin Media will deploy Cisco Digital Video Headend technology in all of its regional and central headends to enable growth in standard-definition (SD) and advanced high-definition TV (HDTV) services. Deployed across Virgin Media’s national fibre optic network, Cisco IP core and edge network technologies will support video delivery to Virgin Media’s high-speed access network. On completion, the new TV platform will be capable of delivering advanced services to more than 12.6 million UK homes.

Cisco is developing an end-to-end digital video solution for Serbia Broadband (SBB) and Telemach in Slovenia to provide rich, interactive and personalized media experiences to their subscribers. Starting November 2009, consumers will be able to access high-definition (HD) video, to be followed by a variety of interactive services such as real-time video on demand (VoD), digital video recording (DVR), gaming, and information retrieval for live news and weather updates. As consumers demand more social, personal and interactive experiences with greater mobility and control, Serbia Broadband is evolving its network into a medianet, an all-IP next-generation network optimized for rich media.

Mediaset, Italy’s largest commercial broadcaster, is moving to all-digital TV production with Cisco medianet technology. The Cisco based digital workflow will yield up to a fourfold increase in newsroom productivity. Mediaset is the first national broadcaster in Europe to deploy an IP-based medianet, a network optimized for video, for video contribution and distribution as a more cost-effective solution than upgrading its legacy Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH) network.

TV 2 selected Cisco technology to launch high-definition digital TV services across Norway. TV 2 Norway has deployed a Cisco MPEG encoding and IP video system platform for its new high-definition digital terrestrial television (HD-DTT) play-out facility in Bergen, Norway. TV 2 chose the Cisco encoding and management platform because of the system’s superb video quality, versatility, and the provision of SD and HD statistical multiplexing.

Cisco has powered the launch of a new video-on-demand service for Polish telecommunication operator ASTER. The ASTER VoD service is capable of providing both HD and SD TV programming for customers in Warsaw, Kraków and Zielona Góra. The Cisco Advanced Video Services Group provided a comprehensive array of integration services to blend the Cisco Content Delivery System (CDS) with third-party products and applications to create a flexible VoD solution and allow ASTER to rapidly roll out the new service. The Cisco solution helps service providers automatically adapt to rapidly changing traffic patterns and deliver their most popular on-demand programming in an easy and cost-efficient way.

Liberty Sports Group used the Cisco MPEG-4 Advanced Video Coding (AVC) and high-definition transcoding platform to launch full-time HD channels for three regional sports networks that will provide more than 8.5 million viewers across 17 U.S. states with sports programming from 23 professional and collegiate teams. The Cisco solution allows Liberty Sports Group to distribute a single MPEG-4 AVC HD video stream for reception by Cisco Advanced Receiver Transcoders, allowing affiliates to convert the incoming video to MPEG-2 HD, MPEG-2 standard definition or analog to protect investments in the large installed base of MPEG-2 set-tops.
Technology Highlights

Cisco is offering a new line of IPTV set-top models that range from sophisticated high-definition digital video recorders (HD-DVRs) to cost-efficient digital interactive set-tops. The new Cisco IPTV and Hybrid set-top series offer more processing power and home networking features than previous models.

Cisco short-listed for Cable & Satellite International Awards in five categories

Cisco medianet technologies have been short-listed in the following categories:

* Best monitoring or network management solution – Cisco Video Assurance Management Solution (VAMS)
* Best customer premise technology – Cisco 8485DVB MPEG-4 HD Hybrid Digital Video Recorder and Media Server
* Best workflow/asset management/automation solution - Cisco Managed Media Solution (C-MMS)
* Best fibre contribution/distribution/transport solution – Cisco ASR 9000 Series Aggregation Services Routers
* Best IPTV technology or service – Cisco Visual Quality Experience (VQE) solution

The awards ceremony will take place on Friday 11th September at IBC. For more details: http://www.cable-satellite.com/awards/
Visual Networking Index Highlights

* All forms of video (TV, video on demand, Internet, and peer-to-peer) will account for more than 91 percent of global consumer traffic by 2013. Internet video alone will account for over 60 percent of all consumer Internet traffic in 2013.
* In 2013, Internet video will be nearly 700 times the U.S. Internet backbone in 2000. It would take well over half a million years to watch all the online video that will cross the network each month in 2013. Internet video will generate more than 18 exabytes per month in 2013.
* Real-time video is growing in importance. By 2013, Internet TV will be more than 4 percent of consumer Internet traffic, and ambient video will be 8 percent of consumer Internet traffic. Live TV has gained substantial ground in the past few years: globally, P2P TV is now slightly over 7 percent of overall peer-to-peer traffic at more than 200 petabytes per month.
* Video-on-demand (VoD) traffic will double every two years through 2013. Consumer IPTV and CATV traffic will grow at a 53 percent compound annual growth rate between 2008 and 2013, compared to a CAGR of 40 percent for consumer Internet traffic.

Source: Cisco Visual Networking Index: Forecast and Methodology, 2008-2013

Cisco white paper: Hyperconnectivity and the Approaching Zettabyte Era
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