MultiChoice Embraces Full Elemental Suite for Portfolio of Video Services

Elemental Technologies, the leading supplier of software-defined video solutions for multiscreen content delivery, today announced that MultiChoice is using Elemental for live streaming and video-on-demand (VOD) delivery of its DStv online service, which makes sports and entertainment content available on smart phones and tablets to more than 10 million subscribers in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Rapidly expanding its portfolio, MultiChoice is also employing Elemental to power the launch of its time-shift satellite VOD (SVOD) service. This new offer will support MultiChoice DStv Box Office and MultiChoice DStv Catch-up such that premium subscribers can watch the latest movies, sports and television shows up to seven days after they air.

“Our biggest challenges with this expansion were managing scalability and our ability to react to market conditions as we launched new services,” said Jean-Pierre Rossouw, Head of Department, Video On Demand Operations for MultiChoice. “With Elemental, we were able to adapt to a rapidly increasing volume of content and growing subscriber base while meeting customer expectations around the clock. It gives us confidence to know that we are using reliable products that come with great support.”

Under management of Elemental® Conductor software, Elemental® Live systems ingest, process and deliver DStv Online content in multiple bitrates to an Akamai CDN for live streaming to mobile devices and the web. In the MultiChoice VOD workflow, Elemental® Server systems transcode content into MP4 and Smooth Streaming formats for output to GB Lab’s Space storage system. Additionally, Elemental software is integrated with the Clearleap multiscreen platform for creation of automated MultiChoice Sport clips with output as MP4 assets and Irdeto for digital rights management (DRM). For its forthcoming SVOD service, MultiChoice will employ the Elemental® Delta video delivery platform to ingest tens of thousands of assets, which will be fed to a CDN for OTT delivery to subscribers.

“As a quality pay television service, MultiChoice is at the cutting edge of technology, content and service, which has resulted in consistent improvements in subscribers’ viewing and enjoyment,” said John Nemeth, VP of Sales, EMEA, for Elemental. “We are pleased to bring the high-resolution, high-performance power of the Elemental software-defined video ecosystem to bear to help MultiChoice deliver quality experiences to its viewers and to support the company’s expansion.”

About MultiChoice

MultiChoice is Africa’s pioneer pay TV provider, having launched the first digital satellite service in the 1980s. MultiChoice Africa provides multi-channel digital pay television services containing channels from Africa, America, China, India, Asia and Europe. The company has over twenty years’ experience and offers cutting-edge digital technology and a selection of bouquets containing premium television channels for subscribers in over 50 African countries and the adjacent Indian Ocean islands. For more information about MultiChoice Africa, please visit www.dstv.com.  

About Elemental

Elemental Technologies, an Amazon Web Services company, is the leading supplier of software-defined video solutions for multiscreen content delivery. Founded in 2006 and headquartered in Portland, Oregon, the company pioneered the use of software-based video processing to distribute video over IP networks. Solutions from Elemental provide the flexibility, scalability and performance required to deliver high quality video via turnkey, cloud-based and virtualized deployment models. Powering video experiences for more than 700 leading media franchises worldwide, Elemental helps pay TV operators, content programmers, broadcasters and enterprise customers bring video to any screen, anytime – all at once. The company has offices in the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, China, Russia, India and Brazil. To learn more, please visit www.elementaltechnologies.com and follow @elementaltech on Twitter.