KAWASAKI, Japan—Media Links will showcase the latest updates to its IP transport solutions at the 2026 NAB Show, April 18-22 in Las Vegas.

A key focus will be Media Links’ Hitless Protection technology, designed to maintain continuous transport of media streams and data even when network conditions are less than ideal. By leveraging standards‑based approaches to redundancy and protection switching, the technology ensures that packet loss or network disruptions do not impact the integrity of live video, audio, or associated data services.

Media Links will also show the latest developments in its Xscend IP media gateway and transport platform. Built with software‑defined modularity and scalability in mind, Xscend supports a wide range of applications, from single‑site deployments to large‑scale, distributed production environments.

Recent enhancements to Xscend include expanded support for HEVC and AVC contribution workflows, delivering more efficient use of network bandwidth without compromising quality or latency.

Media Links’ will also discuss how its Xscend IP transport platform and ProMD EMS network management software are deployed across major live sports environments — from national football leagues in Europe and the Middle East to recent Winter Games workflows — and now support preparations for upcoming World Cup events.

During the 2026 Winter Games, the Xscend platform was used to aggregate and transport contribution feeds across a protected, high‑capacity network serving North American broadcasters, bringing together signals across a complex multi‑vendor ecosystem.

Media Links will also spotlight its role in supporting Video Assistant Referee (VAR) workflows, which use Xscend to transport multiple high‑resolution video feeds between stadiums and centralized officiating centers with ultra‑low latency, allowing referees to review plays in real time.

Whether enabling remote production or inter‑facility connectivity, Media Links says its combination of MDX switches, Xscend and MDP media gateways, and ProMD EMS network management software provides broadcasters and network operators “with a flexible foundation for building and managing IP‑based media networks with the performance and reliability required by today’s live production workflows.”

Media Links will be in Booth W2033 of the West Hall of the LVCC.

MELBOURNE, Fla.—As the industry prepares for the next phase of the FCC’s C-Band transition, USSI Global ‘s new Media Transport Solutions Lab has officially opened on the company’s campus.

Announced in October 2025, the engineering center brings the broadcast and media community a platform-agnostic, controlled environment to test alternatives to C-Band media transport and distribution.

USSI Global’s Media Transport Solutions Lab is focused on the growing complexity at the edge of the network. With decades of experience working at the edge of the network, USSI Global has experienced an influx of fact-finding. These experiences inspired USSI Global to design and build a lab that will accelerate and validate customer-proposed solutions, it said.

“Our Media Transport Solutions Lab offers a secure and professional infrastructure to test theories and design approaches that identify resilient workflows without the time and expense of doing it in-house,” said Anthony Morelli, president and CEO of USSI Global. “Our customers can configure and re-configure the lab environment with their own technology and third-party hardware and execute their testing procedures both remotely and on-prem. Nothing else of this nature exists in our industry, and its arrival could not be timelier.”

Once the FCC makes its final decisions about clearing at least 100MHz of C-Band spectrum and C-Band users determine how to proceed, USSI Global is prepared to assist and accelerate the transition from the auctioned frequencies with its turnkey transitional or managed service offerings for broadcasters, MSOs, service providers and network operators, the company said.

The professional lab setting offers a low-risk path to build and test resilient workflows across satellite, IP and cloud platforms, including hybrid connectivity options. Results could range from a repack of satellite bands, such as C- and Ku-Band, to IP-based distribution that would include fiber, cable, microwave, LEO constellation and 4G/5G mobile or a hybrid combination of all the them.

Companies booking lab time begin by selecting connectivity strategies, redundancy models and real-world scenarios to evaluate. Post-testing, they have access to a wealth of information for review, determine the success of connectivity strategies and analyze whether additional options should be explored.

More information is available on the company’s website.

HACKENSACK, N.J.—The European Broadcasting Union (EBU) has awarded LiveU a five-year contract to deliver 24/7 live news content through its Eurovision News Exchange.

The exchange project is the next step in an ongoing transition from a previously satellite-only system towards IP-based contribution and hybrid distribution. The Eurovision News Exchange will rely on LiveU Matrix for delivery of its members’ live signals throughout Europe and beyond, LiveU said.

"The project marks a decisive step for the broadcasting industry, as major public service media embrace cloud-based IP workflows for faster, more sustainable and cost-efficient live news delivery,” said Emilio San Pedro, EBU head of Eurovision News Exchange. “LiveU’s Matrix platform enables us to connect Europe’s leading broadcasters better than ever and ensure seamless, future-proof live news delivery for audiences everywhere."

The project connects all members with LiveU technology, extending to more than 60 public service newsrooms in Europe and globally, the company said.

The exchange conducted a rigorous evaluation of the company’s LiveU Reliable Transport (LRT)-based delivery with Secure, Reliable Transport (SRT) capabilities and chose the platform for its reliability and scalability, it said.

The project includes a phased rollout—currently in its pilot phase with 15 members—of LiveU Ingest for cloud recording and shared content workflows across both primary and backup channels.

"Following a very tight and highly competitive selection process, we are delighted to partner LiveU to replace the Eurovision News Exchange live contribution and distribution system,” said Piotr Kaszynski, EBU program manager for the renewal of the Eurovision News Exchange live network, said.

“By the end of 2025, the new solution will bring greater flexibility and faster setup times, enabling our members [to have] continuous, reliable access to Eurovision News Exchange live signals,” Kaszynski added. “With LiveU Matrix seamlessly connecting on-prem and field units already used across the News Exchange, this will strengthen collaboration and deliver even more value to our Members and partners."

LiveU's Matrix IP distribution platform sits at the heart of this transformation, enabling seamless contribution and distribution of live news content among members and ad hoc sharing with other sources. The solution integrates 125 LiveU Transceivers deployed at member premises, with Dual Active (active/active) redundancy ensuring that two parallel streams—via cloud and transceiver—guarantee uninterrupted service in each location. This premium layer of Dual Active reliability enhances Matrix's capability to serve as a primary distribution system complement to backup satellite distribution, it said.

The multiregion, multivendor contingency plan relies on global cloud providers in the various regions, further supporting a highly resilient, multilayered architecture. Proactive monitoring is also included in the solution as well as the option to scale up the distribution channels for high-demand events, LiveU said.

Deployment began earlier this year. LiveU Matrix has already been used for major news events, such as the papal conclave. It will be completed in January 2026, when the EBU plans to gradually phase out its satellite contribution workflow and transition to a hybrid distribution and IP-based contribution. The official go-live date for the new IP-based network is set for Jan. 1, 2026, it said.

More information is available on the company’s website.

There’s little doubt IP-based production and contribution continue on a rapid upward trajectory in the Media & Entertainment Industry.

Offering clear advantages like flexibility, cost-efficiency and scalability, IP transport of media essences and metadata throughout studios and in other production settings has become the go-to technology for many media organizations looking for an effective alternative to SDI or a way to augment their existing baseband infrastructure.

However, choosing which IP transport makes the most sense as well as the IP contribution link solution best suited to a given application can be complicated. From a technology point of view alone, literally hundreds of data points must be compared to arrive at a solid decision. And that’s only part of the story.

The other part –and some might say an even more fundamental aspect—is consideration of the non-technical factors that go into selecting the right IP transport and contribution link technology. Things as seemingly unrelated as the revenue potential of a given production or ideal deployment of production personnel can play significant roles in making the right decision about what IP alternatives are best.

Non-Technical Factors While anticipated revenue establishes financial guardrails for all other considerations that factor into decision making, the financial equation actually starts with the size of the event in the case of remote mobile production or live studio shows to be produced in a brick-and-mortar facility.

The bigger the event and corresponding audience size, the greater the budget ad agencies and brands will spend on commercial placement. For example, the average price of a 30-second spot during the most recent Super Bowl—watched by a global audience—averaged $8 million. In contrast, a 30-second commercial during a local University football game could cost around a thousand dollars.

While a rather extreme example, the difference clearly illustrates how size and audience dictate revenue potential, which determines production budget and ultimately the technology—including IP transport and contribution technology—from which to choose.

Many other non-technical considerations factor into selecting the appropriate IP transport and contribution technology for a given project or facility. For instance, how personnel are deployed to support a preferred workflow plays a role as well.

Will everyone be on site for a remote live production, or will only select personnel, such as camera operators and an engineer in charge, be remote while others work from a brick-and-mortar production control room (PCR)? Or will even those PCR personnel work remotely from their homes or offices via their laptops, an internet connection and a cloud instance with virtual production tools?

Ross Video has recently published a new white paper, “How to Select the Right IP Transport,” which examines these and other important considerations that go into selecting the right IP transport and contribution alternative.

A perfect companion for “The Future of Signal Transport in Media" white paper that Ross Video published last year, the latest work offers guidance on what to consider in addition to the technical characteristics of various alternatives when selecting the IP transport and contribution solution that makes the most sense for any given media organization.

To read the new white paper, click here.

With so many alternatives available when it comes to leveraging IP production transport and contribution, deciding on which path to take can feel a bit overwhelming.

Not only are there numerous technical and video quality issues to keep in mind but non-technical factors that in most situations will play an even greater role in which way a media organization ultimately chooses to go.

Money, Money, Money

If money were no object, making decisions about the best IP transport around which to build a video production network would be rather simple. With unlimited funds, bandwidth isn’t really an issue, so why even compress video? Ditto for network management. If money were not an issue, organizations could simply throw more IT personnel at network hiccups, Precision Time Protocol (PTP) clock setup and synchronization maintenance, orchestration and the like.

But for most media organizations most of the time, money is a major factor—whether it’s the revenue-generating potential of the event covered or the production budget associated with those potential earnings.

That’s why those producing the few events at the pinnacle of live television production with massive advertising revenue to support the biggest production budgets, like the Olympics or World Cup, may choose to move uncompressed 1080p HD or even 4K UHD across their SMPTE ST 2110-based production network while a small- to medium-sized TV station with limited financial resources may decide on an NDI network moving an AVC or HEVC compressed video.

As the term implies, “uncompressed” in effect means “untouched.” No effort has been made to reduce the amount of data required. AVC or HEVC on the other hand apply a good deal of compression to reduce the amount of data that must move across the network. So, how much data?

By way of comparison, an uncompressed 1080p 60 HD signal translates into 3000 Megabits per second (or 3Gigabits per second). The same signal compressed using the HEVC codec ranges from 3.5 to 15Mbps, but a nice midpoint is about 10Mbps. Clearly, the bandwidth needed for the latter is far less.

Between these two extremes there are a number of other alternatives, such as IPMX and Dante AV when it comes to IP transport protocols, and JPEG XS and JPEG 2000 when it comes to codecs. Each changes the equation, not simply in terms of how much network bandwidth is necessary but also when it comes to many other technical and non-technical factors, such as latency, workflow, network management and where production personnel will be located.

On top of these decisions, it’s necessary to take on a similar balancing act to select the IP contribution link that best meets a media organization’s needs.

Ross Video has published a new white paper, “How to Select the Right IP Transport,” which examines these and other considerations Media & Entertainment Industry organizations should think about before making a decision about which alternatives best suit their individual needs.

This examination does not seek to recommend one alternative over another but rather to equip readers with the knowledge and background they will need to assess their organization’s requirements and evaluate various options.

Click here to read this new white paper.

As the annual pilgrimage to Las Vegas for NAB Show 2025 nears, it’s time once again for industry suppliers to put forward their solutions and tools for all things content, creation and monetization. AI is, of course, top of mind for anyone in the business of developing and marketing new technologies and will undoubtedly be a big trend to follow before, during and after the big event. But what about the ongoing transition to IP and the promise of greater flexibility, scalability and efficiency?

Not to worry, experts say, IP is here—and here to stay. In fact, according to the annual Big Broadcast Survey produced by industry research and analysis firm Devoncroft, IP networking and content delivery has ranked as the No. 1 most commercially important technology trend for four years running. It’s just that IP isn’t everywhere yet and likely won’t be for quite some time.

Not Just Plug ‘N’ Play
Going IP takes training, according to Stan Moote, chief technology officer for the International Association of Broadcast Manufacturers (IABM), the industry’s trade association for technology suppliers. “With SDI there are patch panels and one can trace/bypass the signal flow in an instant,” Moote said. “With IP it is an entirely different approach, and these skills must be learned.”

Like most innovations and technological transitions, the move to IP has been subject to circumstances and making the right decision based on your respective business goals. Whether you’re operating local, remote, on- or off-prem, using SDI, IP or a combination of both, there are definite challenges and benefits to every scenario.

“I’m super-positive on moving to IP because of the huge benefits,” Moote says. “Actually, though, in some cases, SDI may still make perfect sense, especially if the facility is small, has little interest in live remotes or scalability and has no concern about the constant need for different formats and flavors of both video and audio.”

What, then, can folks planning their NAB calendars expect to see? The benefits of IP seem to be making the largest impact in the production world in several different ways. One is by removing the limitation of distance inherent in SDI connectivity. Using the ubiquitous availability of IP networks to their advantage and leveraging cloud applications as well, broadcasters have incorporated IP into their workflows strategically to gain efficiency. Industry suppliers have countless ways to deliver efficiency with IP.

“There are definitely specific cases now where it’s obvious that IP provides a cost-effective option that didn’t previously exist,” says Imagine Communications Senior Vice President of Product Management John Mailhot, who received SMPTE’s 2024 David Sarnoff Medal for his work in developing the SMPTE 2110 standard.

“For years using SDI, the limitations of the geometry of routers became an impediment—there was constant fighting over who gets which router ports,” he says. “In IP, every single thing is hooked to the network and inherently routable.”

Flexible, Efficient and Infinitely Scalable
This key characteristic of an IP network not only creates enormous flexibility but also makes an IP-enhanced workflow almost infinitely scalable. Former SMPTE President Renard Jenkins, president of I2A2 Solutions and Labs, a technology consultancy and R&D lab focused on innovation, says he has seen this scalability have a tremendous impact on the creative process, as well.

“With video over IP, you can easily increase the number of inputs, which means that you can have better coverage for a single event … more cameras, more microphones, more inputs into your router then you would have if you were dealing with tons of copper cables,” Jenkins says. “This increase in content gathering, especially in live sports and events, allows you to have better, and more, coverage, which on the back-end allows you to create more engaging content and have better creative flexibility.”

This flexibility leads to more efficient workflow setups that enable users to configure their equipment based on the specific needs of one show and then easily reconfigure for another without the need to physically move wires.

One of the keys to capturing these efficiencies is by incorporating a workflow control and orchestration system that allows operators to easily manage a combination of traditional SDI signals along with IP. This is critical not only because the technology works so differently, but because there’s a skills gap—most broadcast engineers weren’t trained to operate within IP networks because they had traditionally been the domain of IT professionals.

Bridging the Gap
Mobile production leader NEP began adopting IP technologies into its workflows early and provided some unique insights in a case study recently published by Cisco Systems.

“We deliver a remote production, a centralized production, where we put product people in one place and we have cameras and lenses in another place across the wide area network—and we’re doing that basically every day,” Marc Segar, NEP Group’s senior vice president of technology, explains. “What we holistically want to do is use hardware wherever it happens to be, and for that you’re going to be completely reliant on the wide area network and the infrastructure you put underneath. But you can’t do that unless you can manage the network and you have control over the network and you have the right tools to be able to do that well.”

Adds Jenkins, “Control and orchestration tools, with an intuitive UI design, that bridge the gap between (networks built using) copper cable and IP networks—along with the knowledge that you need to understand how to operate in both spaces—is paramount for the growth of what we’ve begun to accomplish within our industry today.”

Many vendors will certainly have control and orchestration for IP and hybrid networks near the top of their “things to see” lists at NAB Show. Imagine’s Aviator Orchestrator is one example.

“What Aviator does is it uses ‘cloud-
inspired’ deployment and management mechanics to also deploy and manage applications on-prem,” Mailhot explains. “So, you can deploy on-prem or you can deploy to the cloud over IP. You can use things the same way and create the same on-air look and use the same playout chain.”

The importance of developing consistency in how these so-called hybrid networks are managed can’t be understated. Much as ST 2110 opened the door to interoperability and relatively smooth sailing in IP content transport, standards are needed to ensure the same can be applied to workflow setup and control. IABM and SMPTE are working together to bring this to fruition.

Moote says the IABM, in conjunction with SMPTE, has established a control-plane working group that is developing an open-source, open-standard approach to this challenge. Once it’s ready, a control-plane standard should provide a smoother road to incorporating IP into existing workflows, or new ones, that can easily scale for even the largest and most complex productions.”

Vendors and broadcasters alike are invited to check-in with IABM in the North Hall (N257) while in Las Vegas to learn more.

In recent years, as TV companies and producers pushed to launch streaming services and deploy IP infrastructures, Zixi has been at the center of that tectonic tech change, offering end-to-end software solutions to more than 1,400 customers as well as providing 400 plus integrated partner offerings that enable reliable broadcast-quality video delivery over IP networks.

Founded in 2006, Zixi’s growth has been backed since 2011 by Schooner Capital, who helped it capitalize on a growing demand for streaming and IP technologies and expand its client list to include Amazon Prime Video, AWS Elemental Media Connect, Fox, Fubo, MLB, Net Insight, NHL, Paramount, Roku, SKY, Univision, Wurl, YouTube TV and hundreds of other media and entertainment organizations globally. 

In June the company reached another important milestone in its development with the private equity group Clearhaven Partners, acquiring Zixi. As part of the deal, Zixi’s executive leadership team, which has remained in place, joined Clearhaven and also became investors.

In this Q&A, TV Tech spoke with John Wastcoat, senior vice president of strategic alliances and marketing at Zixi about the Clearhaven deal, the company’s new strategies and their view of the broadcast, streaming and media landscape.  

(The following is an edited transcript.)

TV Tech: Let’s start off with Clearhaven’s investment in Zixi. What does that mean in general terms for the company’s future and its plans?

John Wastcoat: Probably the best place to start is with why we did a transaction now. 

The answer to that is our existing investors have been with us for a really long time and helped us grow into the world leader that we are. It's a fund called Schooner Capital that was run by Vin Ryan, who was a major investor, CEO of Iron Mountain. What he did with the Fund for many years was use his stock from Iron Mountain to fund transactions.  

But about two years ago, the Iron Mountain stock ran out. So they started to think about what other businesses in their portfolio were ready for a transaction and [at Zixi] we started to target doing a deal so that they could start investing in some other businesses. 

Schooner Capital was really great. But we've now got a different partner in Clearhaven Partners. They have made a significant investment to take managing control of Zixi, along with the Zixi management team who co-invested with them. 

Clearhaven is a firm with a great deal of experience and expertise in scaling software organizations. They already have some positions in other companies in the entertainment industry, like Wowza and SundaySky. So they really get it. 

With them, we're going to be able to better serve our customer base and possibly look at some complementary acquisitions that will accelerate our growth.

TVT: Does their investment mark any shifts in your corporate strategies or your market focus in the future?

JW: It's not going to be a change in strategy. It will really be a matter of better executing. We can grow the engineering group to be able to innovate and possibly bring on some complementary technologies as some tuck-in investments. 

They're going to help us grow, and they've also got a broad network of resources from their portfolio companies. We can all help each other share best practices. So, it's going to be about executing at higher velocity going forward. 

Zixi will still be looking to continue to do a lot of business with legacy broadcasters that are moving from satellite to in the cloud. We do a lot with digital-first OTT providers—Google and Apple+ and Amazon Prime video—and with sports leagues, MLB, NHL. We want to grow those relationships, find similar ones in other geographies and continue to take advantage of our markets, which are growing by 30% a year according to an independent study we did. 

TVT: Are you looking at closer ties with the companies in their portfolio in terms of integrating technologies?

JW: In terms of our sister companies, they're going to remain sister companies. Early on, Clearhaven decided that they weren't going to merge us together because we have different customer bases and different technology stacks. But we are looking at technologies that they have that could help us move more quickly and to innovate that might be beneficial to us. We're just a few weeks into this, so we're, we're just starting to explore those relationships.

TVT: Earlier this year, you reported some revenue and operations figures, with recurring revenue from the OTT growing 100% year-over-year while broadcaster customers grew 30% and Zixi’s SDVP was involved in broadcasting over 1.5 million live sporting events. So let's talk a little bit about each of those areas. In the streaming, OTT sector, there's certainly a lot of challenges facing some of the players in that, in terms of trying to attain profitability and reduce costs. Churn levels are really high. The ad market is seeing good growth but there are lot of players fighting for those ad dollars. How do you see that landscape these days and what are you doing to help your clients address some of the trends?

JW: It's going to be a high growth area for us. They do have challenges, but we do help them in a number of ways, including, to better monetize their content. They're looking at more ways to do that with ad tech, and we've got a lot of integrations into our software that help them there. 

We also provide the lowest total cost of ownership. Using Zixi actually drives down their costs because of lower need for compute or egress [resources]. Then they're able to use those savings in different parts of the business, like acquiring new content. 

And that's happening a lot with the OTT platforms. You see people acquiring rights for sporting events, primarily rights the legacy broadcasters had. They are using those rights to drive new sources of income for them, and that only helps us. At the same time, it means we’re helping them reduce costs. We're helping them with new features and functionality in our software to make that content more easily consumed. So we're good partners to them. We drive down costs as they battle for eyeballs.

TVT: How do you see the broadcast market and where we are with the transition from satellite IP video?

JW: It's happening slower than we would have thought or we would like, but it's still happening. Most legacy broadcasters are switching to IP, and they are developing and rolling out their own streaming services for the content. But it's slower than we would want and it's probably slower than they would want, because there is a cost saving to it. 

So, it is an industry that has been slower to change but that's going to continue to grow. I think over the next couple of months going into IBC, you're going to see some announcements from us about some new and bigger customers that are finally taking a bigger bite out of that transition. 

TVT: Why do you think that's gone a little slower than expected? 

JW: Well, I think it goes back to fundamentally the fact that if you are a broadcast engineer, you get fired when there's a black screen. What they have has worked, even if it's more expensive or not as modern or as flexible. So, they’ve been slower to adopt change. But the economics of it are forcing their hand, and the synergies with the streaming offerings are making those changes mandatory. It's accelerating, and we're glad for it.

TVT: As you mentioned a lot of sports rights are streaming right into streaming. How do you see that trend developing? 

JW: The streamers are making active moves to get those content rights, whether it's, you know, the NFL, or the NBA rights are up right now. It's highly competitive because sports is the one thing that you know people are going to watch. That’s why these guys are all focusing on it. 

Netflix, for a long time, didn't want to get into the live business because they needed properties that could be applicable worldwide, but now, they're accelerating their investment and offerings. And Amazon just keeps being aggressive in trying to get all of the stuff that they can, and being smart about driving subscriber growth. Everybody's decided that it's a streaming world and the sports leagues are maximizing that right now. They're making good money repackaging those rights with more competitors that are fighting for them.

TVT: Zixi has also been reporting significant growth in the Zixi enabled network ecosystem of partners. How do you see the future of that effort?

JW: It’s very important for us, because our customers are looking for complementary technologies to their Zixi network that they can plug in and that will work in the end-to-end workflow, whether it's, you know, cameras, encoders, decoders, QA systems, playout, cloud infrastructure. They don't want to have to waste a lot of time by testing each individual piece. A common customer will know that we’ve tested these products in the partner network and that when they plug it in, it's going to work. That improves time to market, and it means that they’re going to be in good shape with whatever they've got now or that they are using to future proof themselves. 

We are going to continue to emphasize that. We put a lot of effort into working with our partners. We've got dedicated resources to developing and maintaining our APIs to quickly solve problems. 

There is an engineering investment from our technology partners that they have to make so we try and make it as easy technically for them to do that. And we are sharing the documentation so that our joint customers can see what they're getting and know how it works very quickly.

TVT: Sustainability and the environmental impact of streaming has become a much bigger issue in recent years. How do you see the progress in that area and what are you doing to help? Obviously there has been progress but there is still a long way to go. 

JW: I think to be very blunt, organizations only care about sustainability, or can only care about sustainability when there's a cost savings associated with it. They're not going to pay extra to realize any gains. 

What Zixi does is severely reduce the amount of computing resources that people have to have. If there is less required, it saves all our partner companies actual dollars and the output into the world is less. So, they can claim a cost win, and they can claim a sustainability win. 

With each version of our software, we improve on that. We are drastically becoming more efficient with every version. And that is dramatically reducing the footprint that our customers have to have. 

We are doing a lot of other things like having an emphasis on remote training and not having to have people on planes. But you know, the real thing that people are taking advantage of is those dramatic efficiencies that are saving people money and improving their footprint. 

MCLEAN, Va.—Intelsat has announced a new content distribution system that will use the internet to transport quality video content around the globe. 

IntelsatOne IP is designed as a global interconnected network powered by a software platform eliminating the need for hardware which makes for faster deployment, the company said. 

The IntelsatOne IP service also builds on Intelsat’s decades of satellite and terrestrial experience to deliver reliability, customer service, global reach, content backup capabilities and scalability, the company said. 

“IntelsatOne IP increases the reach and flexibility of the Intelsat Global Media Network and complements our existing global satellite and fiber footprint,” said Pascale Fromont, vice president of Media at Intelsat. “IntelsatOne IP offers more connectivity options to broadcasters of all sizes looking for more affordable and reliable ways to transport content as well as for those seeking new ways to increase viewership.”

Using Intelsat’s hybrid terrestrial and satellite infrastructure broadcasters are able to access the full Intelsat Global Media Network, bringing connectivity that traditional IP providers are unable to provide.

The IntelsatOne IP product is available now for customers to begin testing use cases and is scheduled by become commercially available as an operational service at a later date, the company said. 

BRUSSELS, BELGIUM—The Alliance for IP Media Solutions is reporting a successful implementation of an open-standards all IP-based live broadcast. The group said the telecast involved a performance at Bozar concert hall carried by Flemish Belgian public broadcaster, VRT.

“An outside broadcast unit at the Bozar concert hall in the city center was connected to the VRT production studio five kilometers—three miles—away via IP, using just a single dark fiber cable,” the group said in a press release. “Signals from four IP cameras, 10 microphones via an IP stagebox, intercom, cam control, tally, Internet and more, were transmitted via the 10 kilometer cable at 25 Gbps. The trial proved the capability to remotely produce live broadcast events via IP, without the use of an OB vehicle.”

This is the second report of the deployment of a live IP-based production workflow, the first having taken place last November in Hilversum, Netherlands. There, NEP’s CMI division, DutchView Infostrada, aired a live program on RTL4 with remote-controlled cloud production using SMPTE-2022— the standard for encapsulating video signals for IP transport—over Grass Valley IP camera technology.

NEP referred to its IP-based broadcast as the “world’s first,” as did AIMS. A spokesman for the AIMS group clarified:

“Both of these broadcasts were live,” he said. “The key difference in terms of being ‘first’ is that the [Bozar] ‘trial’ was produced using a workflow based solely on open standards—[SMPTE] 2022-6, AES67, PTP, OpenFlow—which is the essence of the AIMS mission.”

AIMS was formed late last year by a group of television equipment vendors working on transitioning the industry from serial digital interface to Internet protocol workflow connectivity. The purported benefit of using IP versus SDI in TV production is that it is supported by a far wider range of commercial off-the-shelf hardware compared to SDI. Also, as demonstrated by this and NEP’s productions, it enables the creation of what can be characterized as a virtual television truck, eliminating the need to send crew members and heavy gear to onsite locations.

(It should be noted here that the Pac-12 collegiate sports network in the United States uses its own homegrown IP technology for remote live productions. See “Pac-12 Networks Innovates Live Remote Sports With IP Production Model.”)

AIMS is comprised of Imagine Communications, Belden’s Grass Valley, Cisco, Arista Networks, Snell Advanced Media, EVS, and Lawo among others. The non-profit consortium was formed in December and recently appointed its board, with Michael Cronk, senior vice president of strategic marketing for Grass Valley, as chairman.

A second and separate group of vendors is also working together on the SDI-to-IP transition. ASPEN, for “Adaptive Sample Picture Encapsulation,” was created by Evertz last year.

AIMS is supporting the work of the LiveIP Project, a multi-vendor system integration to showcase IP-based live TV broadcast production, and a collaborative project between the European Broadcast Union and the Belgian public broadcaster VRT. AIMS member companies EVS, Grass Valley, Lawo, Nevion and Tektronix, are industry technology partners within the LiveIP Project, which formed last August.

The Jan. 15 concert in Brussels was carried out under the auspices of LiveIP.

Karel De Bondt, project manager for LiveIP, stated that, “All signals were transmitted via the single cable without noticeable delay, such that technically, there was little difference between an OB truck and a remote production room.”

The multi-phase LiveIP Project is part of VRT Sandbox, an international joint platform for collaborative innovation, put together by VRT, EBU and iMinds. Industry technology partners participating in the project provide all the elements of a live production chain driven by IP; these include Axon, Dwesam, D&MS, EVS, Genelec, Grass Valley, Lawo, Nevion, Tektronix and Trilogy.

AIMS said that it “endorses the work of LiveIP as a primary example of the growing momentum in the broadcast and media content industries towards the adoption, standardization, development and refinement of open protocols in the transition to a fully IP-based workflow, as described in the AIMS Roadmap, with support for SMPTE 2022-6, AES67 and VSF recommendations TR-03 and TR-04.”

AIMS Chairman Michael Cronk said LiveIP “…is a major proof-of-concept of just how far the industry has already moved towards a possible future based on open standards. Not only is it another proof point that a multi-camera live production can be achieved with SMPTE 2022-6 and AES-67 technology, it showcases the wide availability of SMPTE 2022-6 and AES-67 technology as 10 different vendors contributed equipment to this production.”

Open standards work for the SDI-to-IP transition also is being carried by the 74-member Video Services Forum, with the support the Society for Motion Picture and Television Engineers and the EBU.

AIMS endorses an IP transition plan that includes support for SMPTE 2022-6, AES67 and VSF recommendations TR-03 and TR-04.

Also see…

Feb. 19, 2016
“HPA 2016” Remote Live Production”
With trucks, when they’re in use, they’re making money. When they’re parked, they’re not. IP technology held the promise of a more efficient architecture versus the truck fleet, if it could work for live TV production.

Jan. 20, 2016
“‘AIM'-ing for Interoperability”
The new, independent trade association was founded to foster the adoption of industry standards that would help facilitate the broadcast and media industry’s transition from SDI to IP.

Jan. 12, 2016
“Video-Over-IP: AIMS, ASPEN Compared”
While both organizations support the idea that the future of video transport will use IP-like protocols for switching and delivery, they differ in how they manage the important requirement of video synchronization. 

Oct. 20, 2015
“SDI vs. IP: Packet to Packet”
If one looks at the delay through an IP switch, it is due to the necessity to buffer the packets as they arrive, are processed and then sent out.

Oct. 14, 2015
“SDI vs. IP: Which Switch is Which?”
The technology and protocols for each were developed for different use cases and thus have evolved as a best fit for the applications intended. 

December 17, 2015
“All About ASPEN”
Broadcast Engineering Extra spoke with Mo Goyal, director of product marketing for Evertz, to discuss the latest progress on ASPEN, the company’s IP transport protocol which it introduced at the 2015 NAB Show and how broadcasters are managing the overall transition to IP.

December 15, 2015
“ASPEN Framework From Evertz and Sony Deployed by NBC Sports”
A recent collaboration on an IP production framework from Evertz and Sony that is based on ASPEN technology will be deployed by NBC Sports starting in February 2016, the two companies announced.

November 6, 2015
“Evertz Launches Aspen Community Website”
ASPEN stands for Adaptive Sample Picture ENcapsulation and was developed as an open framework to build IP facilities.

LOS ANGELES—A technology-driven migration is taking place in the television engineering community, from baseband SDI-based equipment to IP-based and sometimes virtual technology. The discussion on the virtues and drawbacks of each continue. Last week, the Video Services Forum published a draft Technical Recommendation for “Transport of Uncompressed Elementary Stream Media over IP.” (See “VSF Publishes Draft Technical Rec. for Studio Video-over-IP.”)

Thomas Edwards, vice president of Engineering & Development at Fox Networks Engineering and Operations, has been at the forefront of testing and developing IP-based technologies for video transport for several years. Edwards participated in the group that developed the VSF draft, TR-03. TV Technology asked Edwards why this is significant.

TV Technology: How does TR-03 differ from SMPTE 2022-6? Is non-SDI encapsulation the differentiator?

Edwards: SMPTE ST 2022-6 is encapsulation of the entire SDI signal in IP. VSF TR-03 allows the individual elements of video, audio, and ancillary data to be separately forwarded through a network, and re-composed into different combinations as needed for production purposes.

One interesting aspect is that the ancillary space in HD-SDI uses 16 percent to 38 percent of SDI bandwidth depending on resolution and frame rate, so there is significant bandwidth savings from only transmitting the active video. Now we can finally let go of the legacy of the blanking regions of the CRT by using TR-03.

TV Technology: TR-03 mentions “specific concentration on live production,” meaning real time?

Edwards: Yes, this effort is all about a real-time, low-latency, production-oriented format.

TV Technology: Does this reflect the work you’ve been doing at Fox?

Edwards: Fox has been supporting this work in the VSF Studio Video over IP (SVIP) Activity Group, and we are currently working with Aperi Corp. to create FPGA code to convert between SDI and RFC 4175, the uncompressed video format specified by VSF TR-03.

TV Technology: Is there a limitation to the payload?

Edwards: RFC 4175 can handle video of any bit depth, up to 32,767x32,767 resolution, 4:2:0, 4:2:2, and 4:4:4 color subsamplings, and both progressive and interlace. TR-03 adds BT.2020 color space as well as a SMPTE 2084 HDR EOTF. We feel that RFC 4175 is extensible for any video format we are thinking about.

TR-03 carries audio using AES67, the AES standard for uncompressed audio over IP. This lets the broadcast video industry immediately become compatible with a large number of networked audio systems.

For ancillary data, TR-03 uses IETF draft-ietf-payload-rtp-ancillary, which allows interesting new workflows. No ANC embedders/disembedders are needed, instead devices can contribute or consume ANC data independent of video streams, while maintaining synchronization.

TV Technology: The press release states, “The group studied and documented requirements within the broadcast plant including video, audio, ancillary data, grouping, timing, sequencing, identities, and latency.” Are all of these elements transported independently, without encapsulation, and if so, how is synchronization achieved and maintained?

Edwards: Video, audio, and ancillary data are transported separately. A network clock is distributed using IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol. Streams and synchronized groups of streams are described with IETF Session Description Protocol (SDP).

Sessions are announced with IETF Session Announcement Protocol (SAP). More complex capabilities of identities, registration, and discovery may be addressed by future work of the VSF SVIP AG. Synchronization is provided through IETF RFC 7273 RTP [real-time protocol] Clock Source Signalling, which links PTP time to the RTP media clock.

TV Technology: Further, it states, “It then researched current and proposed solutions, and developed a gap analysis between the requirements and existing solutions.” What were the gaps?

Edwards: I feel that TR-03 did a great job of fulfilling the requirements. Higher level capabilities of identity, registration, and discovery need some additional work. Fortunately, BBC Research & Development has been doing great work in these areas, and may prove them out during the AMWA Networked Media Incubator project. [Advanced Media Workflow Association]

TV Technology:I seem to remember somone suggesting that the work on this in VSF might at some point be adopted or otherwise included in SMPTE-2022. Is that the case? Will this become part of SMPTE-2022?

Edwards: SMPTE ST 2022-6 also uses RTP, like the RTP payloads specified in VSF TR-03. Since SMPTE ST 2022-6 is SDI encapsulated in IP, it will likely have some use in the short term for solutions that need to expose SDI inputs and outputs for mixed SDI/IP installations. But to achieve the maximum flexibility of IP production, there was a need to break these out in elementary streams—audio, video and anciliary data.

For example, one may want to connect different languages of audio with a video, or one may have a device that can generate closed captions, timecode, etc., and those don’t have to be encapsulated in SDI.

On video, there is some bandwidth savings of only sending the active video area than carrying all of SDI because there is less overhead. For the people who are 50p, especially 720p50, the waste of bandwidth in ancillary data space of SDI is significant.

TV Technology:Will this become a part of SMPTE standard.
Edwards: Yes, it is believed that this will go to a SMPTE committee for standardization. The VSF effort involved 60 people from 30 companies who took part in the teleconference meetings to produce the TR, so we know that we have input from a large portion of the industry. From the Fox point of view, that’s very important.

TV Technology:Does this eliminate some of the latency of encapsulation?
Edwards: TR-03 defines the transport and synchronization protocols. How they are used is up to the implementer. There will certainly be subframe latency implementations.
I don’t think latency would necessarily be any less or more than SMPTE 2022-6. Both are using the real-time protocol—RTP. In both protocols, you put a section of uncompressed video into a packet and then send it out over the network. The latency depends on how the how much buffering is required for network jitter. A millisecond or less would suffice for most LAN implementations.

TV Technology:What is the concern with synchronization?
Edwards: There is a real concern among users that synchronization (lip sync, audio imaging, clean switching, etc.) goes out the window when you move to IP media. With a proper implementation, this is not true. Actually when every packet is time stamped accurately, we should have better synchronization between media streams than SDI solutions could provide. Synchronization was an important set of requirements for the development of TR-03.

TV Technology:How does this fit with ASPEN, TICO, et al?
Edwards: It’s true that lots of transport protocols are being announced. That’s why we thought it was important to encourage the industry to adopt a common transport protocol. And so Fox decided to support the SVIP AG. The VSF was able to develop this Technical Recommendation in a year and a half.

Hopefully, we won’t have the situation that happened with networked audio, with 10 different audio formats. It delayed widespread implementation by over ten years, because you’d buy one device from one vendor, and it wouldn’t work with another device from another vendor. After a long period of multiple, incompatible transport protocols, the AES developed AES67, which many networked audio vendors are now supporting. Because of this, the VSF SVIP AG adopted AES67 in TR-03 to continue that interoperable compatibility.

TV Technology:Does this accommodate a hybrid world?
Edwards: This is looking toward a world that’s all IP, but there will be a period of hybrid SDI/IP. I will be giving a talk at the SMPTE 2015 Annual Technical Conference on elementary streams over IP, which with the publication by the VSF will basically be about TR-03.

TV Technology:Will this be real time?
Edwards: Yes.

TV Technology:What would you like to add?
Edwards: We’re not doing this just for fun. The move to IP is about improving the agility of our broadcast operation. How do we get there? By moving to a virtualized facility. And how do we get to a virtualized facility? Using COTS hardware equipment and IP. It’s all part of a strategy to improve the agility of the broadcast plant.

There are other advantages in the short term as well. Fox Sports’ new Encore production truck, for example, was able to dramatically impove signal density by putting a large number of video flows over 10 GbE.

There may not be a cost advantage today—I think the costs are nearly equivalent now. But IP solutions will get cheaper over time. We know that IP networking technology is being driven by the hyperscale data centers, which are now moving from 10 Gbps this year to 25 Gbps, 50 Gbps, and 100 Gbps in the LAN shortly.

TV Technology:Why is TR-03 important?
Edwards: It represents a key element of cooperation in the industry on a common protocol. This is the beginning of a revolution.

The draft TR is “TR-03 - Transport of Uncompressed Elementary Stream Media over IP“ (Published as a draft.)

Also see...
October 23, 2015
“VSF Publishes Draft Technical Rec. for Studio Video-over-IP“
The VSF SVIP Activity Group was tasked with developing a standard for video-over-IP without SDI encapsulation with a specific concentration on live production.

October 22, 2015
“UHD In a Hybrid SDI/IP World“
“There are more and more technology partnerships between vendors; this is something I’m seeing more and more of, which I haven’t seen in the past.”

October 20, 2015
“SDI vs. IP: Packet to Packet“
If one looks at the delay through an IP switch, it is due to the necessity to buffer the packets as they arrive, are processed and then sent out. Depending on the switch design, the traffic load, and the packet size, the performance required in terms of packet loss dictates the buffer sizes.

October 19 2015
“Global HDR TV Shipments to Exceed 32 Million in 2019“
IHS forecasts that unit shipments of HDR TVs globally will grow from 2.9 million in 2016 to 32.6 million in 2019.

October 19 2015
“AES Delves Into IP Audio, OTT“
Television broadcasting has gone through numerous significant changes since the first station went on-air more than 80 years ago, but nothing may prove to have such an impact on the medium as IP technology.

October 14, 2015
“SDI vs. IP: Which Switch is Which?“
If major industries, including manufacturing, transportation, telecommunications, commerce and banking, have adopted IP, why not real-time video production?

July 23, 2015
“Test Vendors Straddle the Worlds of SDI and IP“
It doesn’t really matter what is broken these days, it’s either deemed disposable or worthy of repair.

June 10, 2015
“IP for Broadcast: A Conversation with Thomas Edwards of Fox“
The main drive for moving from SDI/AES to IP is the need to enhance flexibility and agility of the broadcast plant.

October 22, 2014
“SMPTE 2014: Uncompressed Video Over COTS Ethernet Switches“
How many packets are dropped by Ethernet switches moving video? Thomas Edwards of Fox set about with Aperi Corp. to find out.

June 28, 2010
“Uncompressed Video Over IP“ ~ by Thomas Edwards
Today, the use of compressed video (such as MPEG-2 or H.264) over IP is no longer unusual.