IBC2014: BBC Taps Globecast to Prep, Playout and Distribute 30 Channels

AMSTERDAM — Globecast has entered into a long-term partnership with BBC Worldwide to provide content preparation, playout and distribution services for up to 30 channels globally.

Globecast will be the primary technical partner for these services, handling channels that were previously supported by multiple service providers across multiple regions.Moving the whole operation to a single service provider means a more cost-effective, flexible and efficient playout and distribution workflow than would have been possible with the current multitude of separate providers, Globecast said.

Globecast is able to re-assign channels to different regions as and when needed. It says its tightly integrated solution allows faster content turnaround, significantly reducing the window between U.K. and international broadcast for key programming. Globecast will also provide flexible capacity for rapid channel deployments where opportunities are identified.

BBCW is using Globecast’s newly announced Media Factory, a unified, converged workflow to prepare and playout content. It provides a dedicated web portal enabling more efficient and secure orchestration of content preparation by the broadcaster, Globecast and selected partners. The web portal will allow BBCW to track the progress of content through the workflow, providing a live service health dashboard for playout and global channel distribution.

Globecast is also offering Edge Playout as part of its package, enabling additional revenue from existing services by delivering them to new territories and regionalising them. Globecast’s global fiber network enables the integrated site diverse disaster recovery solution to be seamlessly fed to all of the distribution points without the need for dedicated network infrastructure.

Playout and distribution for BBCW will be handled from Globecast’s London facility, by a team of dedicated channel managers.