Tandberg Gets Starz Treatment for On-Demand Services
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Starz Entertainment has selected the next-generation MediaPath Secure Content Delivery System from Tandberg Television to deliver the content for its on-demand services. The upgrade provides Starz with DVB-S2 satellite delivery and other enhanced features, enabling Starz to deliver more content to its affiliates at faster rates.
Starz On Demand, Encore On Demand, and MoviePlex On Demand provide hundreds of movies each month to subscribers viewing on cable, satellite, and broadband platforms. This on-demand content is currently delivered from Starz to its affiliates, using the Tandberg Classic MediaPath system. A seamless migration path is provided by the new MediaPath system, ensuring that Starz and affiliate service is not interrupted. Since MediaPath now supports MPEG-4 AVC as well as virtually any content file and metadata format, Starz may support more delivery methods to its affiliates and offer a wider selection of content to its subscribers.
“Staying competitive in the entertainment business means offering what viewers want, often before they know they want it. For Starz, that means we are constantly seeking ways to expand our programming options and searching for new technology to increase our competitive edge,” said Ray Milius, SVP of programming and IT operations at Starz Entertainment. “We chose Tandberg Television’s next-generation MediaPath system because it supports the bandwidth needed to handle the number of titles and formats that Starz delivers. The user interface has the flexibility to scale from our current needs to accommodate our future requirements.”
According to Tandberg, the new MediaPath system radically changes the economics of content distribution and, in some networks, doubles or triples capacity and throughput. Proactive monitoring ensures that content is flowing throughout the delivery system. An enhanced user interface provides easy access to the added functions and increased options available with the new MediaPath system.
“The programming community has placed its trust in MediaPath as the secure and efficient solution for managing their VOD content distribution since 2001. To achieve our goals for this new version of MediaPath, creating a more efficient delivery method for content distributed to both traditional and new TV platforms wasn’t enough. It also had to support the existing key features and new delivery methods simultaneously, allowing customers like Starz and their affiliates to migrate to the new system on their schedule, not ours,” said Al Nuñez, president of the Americas, Tandberg Television. “It is an honor to have Starz select this new MediaPath solution and to place their trust in us, again.”