Video compression technology has been recognised as key to helping Sky in Italy halve the HD bandwidth of its full HD IPTV service. A recent upgrade involving video compression has enabled Sky to expand the reach of its full HD offering over an existing IP infrastructure.
The broadcaster recently announced it had reduced the HD bitrate of its IP service from 8 to 4 Mbps using V-Nova’s Perseus video compression technology. The solution was deployed as a software-only upgrade of not only Sky’s existing Harmonic ViBE VS7000 video encoders encoders but also of the installed base of Sky set-top boxes in Italy.
“We upgraded our headend and set-top boxes to bring the average HD bitrate down and by halving the bandwidth requirement,” commented Massimo Bertolotti, head of innovation and engineering at Sky in Italy. “V-Nova Perseus has enabled us to enhance the viewing experience for our customers and meet our IPTV business objectives more quickly. We hope to set an example for what it is possible to achieve on deployed infrastructures through the use of new technologies.”
This project is described by V-Nova as ‘the coronation of the work the company has done with Sky in Italy’. This most recent IPTV platform upgrade followed the initial deployment by V-Nova of the broadcaster’s contribution network.
“Consumers want the same Quality of Service (QoS) whatever the platform and we are proud to help Sky in Italy expand the reach of their service massively while maintaining the picture quality they are recognised for,” added Guido Meardi, V-Nova chief executive and co-founder. “Importantly, we were able to achieve this on an infrastructure that had been already deployed without changing the existing workflows.”
V-Nova Perseus is a video processing technology that aims to close the capacity gap for quality delivery to connected devices over existing networks. It’s described as software that redraws the traditional quality-bitrate curve, enabling operators and service providers to provide high quality video, both linear and non-linear, within their bandwidth constraints.
“We are delighted with the results we have achieved together, when many told us it was simply not possible,” concluded Eric Achtmann, executive chairman and co-founder of V-Nova.
Source: http://www.iptv-news.com/2016/04/sky-expands-reach-of-full-hd-italian-iptv-offer/