Tech Features

January 15, 2015

As demand for TV everywhere grows, broadcasters must face the reality of providing an immersive experience to viewers, which means better connectivity and improved online services A decade ago, broadcast commentators...

Optimising OTT opportunity

January 9, 2015

Mohamed Hamed is Head of Business Development & Sales at Piksel.OTT opportunities abound in the Middle East, thanks to the high uptake of smartphones and tabs....

Beaming knowledge through Satellites

January 7, 2015

THE INFRASTRUCTURE: ISSUES WITH HARDWARE, INTERNET AND SECURITYRural, remote and low-income regions across Asia, Africa and the Middle East tend to have weak computing and internet infrastructure at school and...

Broadcasters meet applications

December 2, 2014

Meghali Sharma, Intigral.Thanks to a world of ever-evolving smart applications, television viewership has become a multiscreen experience. The disruption has become the new industry norm, and...

Airborne Satellite COTM

by Clayton Vallabhan

November 17, 2014

Traditional Data ApplicationsThere are two primary sets of applications for airborne COTM. The first is what are considered traditional data applications, such as email, video conferencing and VoIP. The second...

The future of channel-in-a-box

November 14, 2014

Andy Warman.Playout systems continue to improve function integration with an emphasis on play to air, but the robust functionality of the channel-in-a-box system raises questions of...

Decoding HEVC

October 7, 2014

HEVC was developed in response to the growing need for higher compression of moving pictures. While it has much promise as a compression technology, HEVC is probably not the wisest...

Crisis Management

September 22, 2014

With evolving broadcast technology, disaster recoveryhas taken the software approach and broadcasters are investingin multi-site operations for data to be synchronised across the globeWeve all heard the phrase Disaster Recovery...

Keeping pirates at bay

September 20, 2014

Eleuterio Fernandes, Exterity.Security is key in professional IPTV and is likely to become more important as the reach of these services grows. Eleuterio Fernandes sheds light...

Maximise your MAM

September 12, 2014

Julián Fernández-Campón.In todays digital world, MAM offers much more than a database and has transitioned to a content management system thats fully integrated with the entire...

Traditional telcos must adapt or perish

September 11, 2014

Traditional pay-TV and telco companies are losing subscribersand revenue to the open internet and OTT players. They need to adapt quickly to stay in the game, says Ben KinealyYouTube channel...

Improve standards with DVB-T2

September 7, 2014

Martyn Horspool is Business Development Manager at GatesAir.The global progress of digital terrestrial broadcasting has many sides to explore, but no recent development has made a...

Collaboration is key in the teleports business

by Clayton Vallabhan

September 1, 2014

The broadcast market has been witnessing a swelling number of TV channels in the MENA region for some time, with significant growth seen in the last 10 years. The cherry...

Smarter Stadiums

July 12, 2014

Luc Doneux, Executive Vice President Sports Division, EVS.Smart devices, coupled with ubiquitous broadband connectivity, is transforming the way we consume media and this is something that...

IPTV: in the cloud

July 2, 2014

Rino Petricola, COO and GM at Front Porch Digital.With growing appetite among consumers for connected TVs, direct online publishing that is connected to the cloud makes...

MSS the way forward for governments?

July 1, 2014

With the global economy still in a slow recovery mode, government budgets will remain constrained. At the same time, governments have to ensure that their ICT infrastructure deployed for national...

Intelligent archiving

June 12, 2014

It is only by reimagining archive as a unified repository of assets, which are integral to production, preparation and delivery workflows, that its value can be unlocked, says Raoul CospenContent...

Channel without a box

June 2, 2014

Karl Mehring, Senior Product Manager for TV Everywhere at Snell.The concept of channel-in-a-box is nearly mainstream and the technology will continue to evolve. Manufacturers now attempt...

Tackling 8K broadcast

May 22, 2014

Ian Trow is Senior Director of Emerging Technology and Strategy at Harmonic.While NHK and the Japanese government have been very proactive in promoting 8K, the format may...

MAM – the beginning is really the end

May 18, 2014

Michael Shore is Co-founder of Pronology.When choosing an appropriate MAM solution, the user needs to understand that each companys MAM needs are different. While some may choose...

Sporting an 8K future

May 12, 2014

John Ive is Director of Business Development & Technology at IABM.Although it is still early to predict how quick the adoption of higher resolutions will be,...

The bridge to IP

April 16, 2014

Chuck Meyer, CTO, Core Products at Miranda Technologies.The key to designing a facility that can successfully implement an IP-based system lies in fully understanding the technology,...

Wired for live sport

April 12, 2014

Sport is one of the most popular genres on television, and the Middle East is rapidly increasing its sports facilities, not least in advance of the World Cup in 2022....

Fibre backhaul for 3G

April 9, 2014

Shibu Vahid, Head of Technical Operations, R&M Middle East, Turkey and Africa.As fast-growing traffic continues to stretch the capacity of 3G networks to their limit, fibre...

OTT Challenges and opportunities for MEA

March 20, 2014

OTT opens up new opportunities and revenue streams for television channels but comes with its own set of challenges, says Safia RanaThe Middle East has witnessed an explosion in the...

Renewing the newsroom

March 11, 2014

With the rapid uptake of mobile devices, broadcast professionals must have a reliable multiplatform content delivery solution that provides a cost-efficient workflow and greater flexibility than ever beforeIn an increasingly...

Cloud to the rescue

March 4, 2014

Embracing a cloud-based CSM system can provide a media company with the benefits of content storage management while sparing them the headache of operational costs, says Rino PetricolaMedia assets are...

Optimising digital television transmission

February 12, 2014

As digitisation of television becomes more widespread, the focus is now shifting on achieving impeccable transmission. We look at some of the prerequisites for delivering quality and choice to the...

OTT: The wild frontier

February 10, 2014

OTT offers innumerable opportunities that also come with a host of challenges. With more viewers taking to the second and third screens, broadcasters want to grab a share of the...

4K reality check

January 9, 2014

The standards are progressing rapidly, so industry players must decide how much and how quickly they must invest in 4K UHDTV technology to match consumer demand when the new services...

Radio Mirchi strikes a chord

January 5, 2014

Launched in February 2012, Radio Mirchi is a recent Indian export to the UAE. The Hindi and English radio station, owned by Abu Dhabi Media, caters to the South Asian...

LED shines bright

January 2, 2014

LED lighting continues to prove its popularity and effectiveness in filmmaking, broadcasting environments and television production. The wider adoption of LED lighting in production will continue to evolve due to...

Priming the OTT market

December 6, 2013

OTT in the Middle East offers a unique opportunity for broadcasters, who need to understand that a modular approach to these solutions is the way forwardNot so long ago, we...

The road to IPTV

November 7, 2013

Steve Coutts.IPTVs adoption in the Middle East has not been so widespread despite its advantages. A look at the challenges that the operators face in the...

Making the cut

October 12, 2013

Post production is now completely non-linear and fully collaborative, allowing different departments to work on the same content simultaneously, thereby simplifying workflow and improving production qualityPost production was a mechanical...

Relationships play key role in CDN evolution

September 7, 2013

Andrew Jones.With more devices accessing content in a variety of formats, CDNs have the tools, knowledge and, more importantly, relationships to help broadcasters evolve their platformsThe...

Keep it short

September 6, 2013

Stuart Brown, Cobham.In a highly competitive broadcast environment, small but powerful broadcast technology benefits from customer-driven requirementsIn a see-it-now world, you have to figure out how...

The great migration

September 2, 2013

Although the idea of 4K imaging is not new, its adoption has been posing a challenge for broadcasters. With more momentum being built around the technology, we explore some of...

Selling the second screen

August 6, 2013

As consumers viewing habits continue to change with second screens becoming more prevalent, broadcasters need to adopt smart strategies to monetise content thats available to them, says Johann SchreursAs smart devices,...

Addressing broadcasting challenges

August 6, 2013

File-based automation offers a flexible platform for complex broadcast challenges. Craig Newbury advises broadcasters in the region to use file-based automation to manage one or many key processes easily through...

The economics of multi-platform delivery

July 12, 2013

It is vital to know the cost of delivering content on multiple platforms in order to develop a monetisation strategy. Tony Taylor discusses the challenges facing broadcasters today and recommends...

Sound entertainment

July 9, 2013

Saleh Lootah, CTO at DMI.Dubai Media Incorporated used surround sound capture for the first time with TSL PPL SoundField DSF-B Digital Broadcast Surround Microphone package to...

Automation on the fast track

June 12, 2013

The development of playout automation for television neatly parallels, and encapsulates, the dramatic changes that computers and off-the-shelf IT hardware have brought to the broadcast business. It is also a...

New media hits new shores

June 12, 2013

Its the right time to tap into the multiscreen viewing opportunity in emerging markets as online viewing gains momentum, says Jennifer BaischMarkets such as the Middle East hold enormous potential...

MAM delivers winning formula

June 11, 2013

Raoul Cospen.Content producers must re-invent their business models to capture new markets and reduce production costs.The first step to this is to implement a proper media...

Improving broadcast workflows

May 12, 2013

Peter Gallen, Product Manager, Tedial.There was a time when broadcast processes were solely controlled by humans but in the past two decades, a number of automated...

Reel Effects

May 12, 2013

Chris Bradshaw, SVP, Media & Entertainment, Chief Marketing Officer, Autodesk talks to BroadcastPro ME about how filmmakers are increasingly amalgamating storytelling, artistry and technologyVisual effects have come a long way....

The challenges of delivering a multiscreen experience – Part II

by Vijaya Cherian

May 7, 2013

Live PipelineThe trend has been to separate encoding from the packaging and encryption functions to provide greater flexibility. Depending on the resilience of the design (N, N+1 or 2N encoders per live...

Turning Big Data into Smart Data

April 9, 2013

Understand viewer-watching trends with multiscreen monitoring to score big returns, says Arman AygenTraditional broadcast is a one-way communications system that was used to set trends and create needs. For many...

Highly Defined Entertainment

April 3, 2013

In an age where we have supposedly moved beyond theory and into the practice of High Definition TV, its time trevisit the format and see what benefits it is bringing...

The challenges in delivering a multiscreen experience

April 3, 2013

When the answer to "whats on?" is "everything" and the answer to "whos on?" is "no-one", then content discovery and experience is kingThe explosion in the number of connected devices...

Exploring secure and sustainable models for multiscreen content distribution

April 2, 2013

Tom Jahr is EVP Products & Partners at Conax.While a growing range of new consumer devices, video and distribution formats continue to create demand for more...

Whats Next for Anytime, Anywhere TV?

April 2, 2013

The rapid and global growth of the handheld device market, the emergence of more robust network infrastructures, and the drop in the cost of bandwidth is causing a shift in...

Global media consulting firm launched

April 2, 2013

Chris lennon, President and CEO, MediAnswers.Well-known industry names, Chris Lennon and Peter Storer have launched a consulting firm in the run up to NAB.MediAnswers is a...

Beaming from Makkah

by Vijaya Cherian

April 1, 2013

Saudi-based systems integrator First Gulf Company has secured a deal to deliver a full 1080p HD broadcast facility that includes the installation of a whopping 96 cameras in Makkah. When...

iPlayer to have exclusive content from BBC

March 22, 2013

The BBC has commissioned a drama strand exclusively for its iPlayer platform, in an extension of its strategy to bolster its digital content portfolio.The new drama strand comprises a joint...

Metus INGEST takes to AVID

March 8, 2013

Metus, a media management software which recently became an AVID licensee, has added DnxHD support to Metus INGEST. It is now possible to capture in Avid compliant DnxHD Op-Atom MXF files with Metus INGEST....

OSN Play now available on Google’s Play Store

March 7, 2013

OSN Play is now available as a free application on Google's Play Store, enabling more OSN viewers across the region to enjoy premium Arabic and English entertainment and live sport...

Qatar Radio adopts NETIAs Radio-Assist 8.1 automation software