Jean-Marc Racine, chief product officer, Haivision, details how broadcasters are trying to do more while spending less, and how the move to IP can help with that goal.
What industry trends have particularly stood out for you in 2023, and why?
The need for efficiency at all levels of broadcast operations to deliver more within a given budget, which looks to be stable year-over-year and, in some cases, may be declining under the economic pressure faced by some broadcasters. This has led many to invest in flexible technology solutions that can adapt to multiple use cases and different environments.
With these new investments, we see broadcasters seeking to fully embrace IP, as newer facilities are built with IP in mind. Interestingly, many still have SDI capabilities to cater to existing technology until they reach end-of-life.
What impact are you seeing those trends having on the media and entertainment industry?
We’re seeing a need for low-cost production from many broadcasters – not just the smaller broadcasters as in the past. This indicates that the trend is truly taking shape throughout the industry. Now, mainstream broadcasters are ensuring that production costs are in line with the potential revenue of a programme and are adapting their production infrastructure accordingly to be able to cope with both inexpensive content production, as well as premium content. This, again, points towards the need for flexible investments.
How do you see those trends developing further in 2024?
We don’t expect dramatic changes in 2024, however the Summer Games in Paris will no doubt drive investment in solutions serving IP workflows, as many broadcasters will use the games as an opportunity to refresh their technical stack.
With IP workflows advancing in 2024, I also think that this will be the year that SRT, originally developed by Haivision and available as open-source technology since 2017, will come to the forefront as the dominant way to transport video. As shown in our yearly Broadcast Transformation Report, SRT has been the preferred method of video transport for some time. With many tier-1 broadcasters and third-party technology companies placing SRT at the forefront of their content distribution capabilities, it’s clear that we’re reaching the point where SRT has become a de facto standard.
Do you expect to see any new trends within the industry in 2024, and what will they be?
I believe in 2024 we will see the balance between cloud and on-premise workflows reach a point of maturity. We’re seeing that broadcasters are gaining a better understanding of cloud production and can identify the pros and cons of when to leverage it, taking into account aspects such as total cost, flexibility, latency, and best use of existing investments.
I think we’ll start seeing a pattern that repeats itself from broadcaster to broadcaster on how the cloud is leveraged and we see this as a sign of maturity regarding how the industry approaches cloud moving forward.
