| By: Carolyn Braff, Managing Editor | Published: November 5, 2009 |
Akamai Technologies and iStreamPlanet have been selected to work with Microsoft Corp. to provide an integrated, end-to-end solution to deliver live and on-demand video online for NBC during the network’s coverage of the Vancouver Olympic Winter Games, February 12-28. The solution will leverage Microsoft IIS Smooth Streaming to deliver an uninterrupted streaming experience to online audiences via Microsoft Silverlight-based media players.
In addition, Inlet Technologies has been selected to provide Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) Live Smooth Streaming online video for NBC Universal. Inlet’s Spinnaker family of encoding solutions provides broadcast-quality streams over the Internet to multiple screens and devices. With its built-in support for adaptive streaming protocols, including IIS Live Smooth Streaming, Spinnaker generates high-quality streams that enhance online viewing of live sports action. For NBC’s coverage of the Vancouver Winter Olympics, Spinnaker will provide high-definition streams in real time at resolutions up to 720p. Spinnaker also will enable Olympic Winter Games fans on NBCOlympics.com to easily switch between multiple events.
“Inlet is proud to help NBC deliver the highest quality live streams of Vancouver Winter Olympics coverage,” says John Bishop, senior vice president of strategy and business development, Inlet Technologies. “Spinnaker, combined with IIS Live Smooth Streaming, will ensure that viewers have access to higher quality video and viewing controls than in the past, helping NBC to improve viewer retention and the time fans spend enjoying Olympic Winter Games coverage online. We look forward to being part of this monumental event.”
iStreamPlanet will be providing turnkey satellite downlink encoding and production services to the Smooth Streaming for Silverlight format and the video will be delivered to online audiences over the Akamai HD Network. iStreamPlanet will be encoding 23 video feeds including nine venue feeds, four broadcast feeds, one Olympic News Channel, six Beauty Cams, two Victory Ceremonies, and one Press Conference. All 23 feeds will originate from Vancouver, British Columbia and will be transported to iStreamPlanet’s Las Vegas Webcast Operations Center over OC12 via IP multicast.
The NBC Olympics online Silverlight player will leverage Akamai HD for Microsoft Silverlight and the Akamai HD Network, Akamai’s video delivery offering, to deliver both live and on demand streaming to broadcast-sized audiences with a personalized and interactive online experience. A key feature of Akamai HD for Microsoft Silverlight is adaptive bitrate streaming based on IIS Smooth Streaming, which is architected to enable uninterrupted video playback at HD bitrates that seamlessly adjust to fluctuations in available bandwidth to provide the best quality possible for each user.
“With consumer appetite for online video increasing and quality improving, we expect the Vancouver Olympic Winter Games will prove to be a milestone in innovation and online video,” says Robert Hughes, EVP of global sales, services and marketing at Akamai. “Akamai is thrilled to support NBC’s innovative coverage of this global event. The Akamai HD Network is designed to let broadcasters enhance television coverage by enabling the highest possible online video experiences, complete with interactivity and at broadcast scale.”
“We are honored to be chosen to assist NBC and Microsoft in what we believe will be a historic webcast,” says Mio Babic, president and CEO, iStreamPlanet. “Drawing on our vast experience in live events, we have worked closely with Akamai and NBC to put together a solution that we believe will provide a unique experience for viewers of the Vancouver Winter Games.”
iStreamPlanet is collaborating with Akamai on the content ingestion and publishing points management architecture to make sure all created content is delivered in the highest possible quality.
“NBC has chosen the best combination of partners in iStreamPlanet and Akamai to enable its online coverage of the Vancouver Winter Olympics,” says Perkins Miller, SVP, digital media, NBC Olympics. “iStreamPlanet’s automated architecture for downlink and encoding combined with Akamai’s HD Network ensure our coverage will be the best possible quality available for our viewers during the Vancouver Winter Games.”
To streamline the content acquisition, encoding and live streams provisioning process including failover scenarios, iStreamPlanet has developed a workflow automation service that enables NBC to start and stop acquiring the desired multicast stream, route that stream to the available encoder, provision all publishing points required to run the live event, pass created encoding profile information including server ingest information to the designated encoder, start encoding and notify NBC’s scheduling system when the encoding process has started and stopped as well as return live event start times so play-by-play data can be synched with the video and audio.
Related Stories
Sponsor Microsite Spotlight
Sponsor Microsites
Team SVG
