Emerging Technologies in the Broadcasting Sector

Leago Takalani
Executive: Technology
SENTECH SOC Ltd
1 INTRODUCTION

2 SOME BACKGROUND

3 GLOBAL REFLECTIONS

4 SOUTH AFRICAN CONTEXT

5 SOME PRACTICAL POSSIBILITIES FOR THE FUTURE

 INTRODUCTION

• Presentation aims to provide an outlook on the emerging technologies and impact on the role of
ECNS licensees providing signal distribution services.

• The presentation aims to stimulate discussion in the area of digitisation, convergence and role of
ECNS licensees that provide content distribution services such as SENTECH. This will also form as
input towards the construct of information that will assist the Panel/DTPS to formulate appropriate
Policy Options for the Discussion Paper to be gazetted in November 2014 (toward finalisation of a
White Paper in 2015)

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1 INTRODUCTION

2 BACKGROUND

3 GLOBAL REFLECTIONS

4 SOUTH AFRICAN CONTEXT

5 SOME PRACTICAL POSSIBILITIES FOR THE FUTURE

 INTRODUCTION

VALUES
● Integrity: We act with honesty, fairness and
openness;
VISION
● Quality Customer Service: We are committed to
To be a world-class provider of sustainable communications proactively ensuring high values of customer
platform services in South Africa and the rest of the African satisfaction and building a relationship based on trust;
Continent.
● Innovation: We endeavour to develop and support
creativity and responsible risk-taking;

MISSION ● Accountability: We deliver on our promises and take

To provide open access and interoperable communications responsibility for our actions; and

platform services that enable affordable universal access to

● Social Responsibility: We endeavour to fulfill our
digital content services, in the context of South Africa’s socio-
mandate in a manner that benefits our employees,
political imperatives as a developmental state.
customers, suppliers, communities and the
environment in all the areas that the Company
operates in. 

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 INTRODUCTION

• SENTECH’s Public Service mandate was originally provided for in:

– The SENTECH Act (No. 63 of 1996) – For Broadcasting Signal Distribution Services

“...to provide, as a common carrier, broadcasting signal distribution, for broadcasting licensees in accordance with
the provisions of the Independent Broadcasting Authority Act...”;

• Since then, the mandate has been generalized and incorporated in the ECA and amended SENTECH Act:

– The Electronic Communications Act (No. 36 of 2005) – For Converged Communications Services
“...to provide electronic communications services and electronic communications network services in accordance
with the Electronic Communications Act.”

• SENTECH carries a common carrier obligation in terms of the ECA and by virtue of the conversion of the old
broadcast signal distribution license to a specific ECNS license.

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 TECHNOLOGY REFLECTIONS

• A reflection of the television evolution:

Broadcast

Cloud

Broadcast + Internet
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 TRADITIONAL VALUE CHAIN:

Broadcasters Signal Distribution Consumer

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 EVOLUTION TO CONTENT DISTRIBUTION VALUE CHAIN:

• SENTECH believes that the digitisation of the broadcasting signal distribution signal network to IP data transmission

network and the continued evolution of the mobile technology is forcing changes in the regulatory environment and is

impacting on the conditions of competition in both the telecommunications and broadcasting industry.

• Technological evolution has enabled the possibility of triple play products including telecommunications, TV and the

Internet. As technological evolution has changed how the market can be contested, the regulatory environment is therefore

required to make convergence a mutual beneficial environment.

• The motivation for converged networks is driven by the increasing demand from consumers to have greater variety of

communications and media services on modernistic platforms and on various wireless portable devices. This demand is

powered by the fact that consumers have now become content producers and are constantly seeking cost efficient and

reliable ways of sharing/distributing content.

• Therefore moving forward, the broadcasting and telecommunications industry should not be reviewed without taking into

consideration the requirement of network convergence and the required change to the current legislative framework of

ECNS, ECS and BS licensing categories.

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 EVOLUTION TO CONTENT DISTRIBUTION VALUE CHAIN
CONT…

INGEST PACKAGE CONVERT DELIVER DISTRIBUTE RECEIVE

MPEG-TS STREAM
STB
ANALOG VIDEO LINEAR
ANALOG MPEG
MUX RECIEVER
LIVE FEED ENCODER
DATA
IP SATELLITE PUSH VOD
MEDIA CLIP LIVE FEED UPLINK CLIENT

DVB STREAM TRANSCODER HBBTV

CLIENT
IP STREAM
LIVE
MHEG MHEG STREAMING
VOICE PACKAGER CAROUSEL MHEG CLIENT
SERVER
PHYSICAL
MEDIA CLIPS
HBBTV HBBTV ON DEMAND CAM
SENTECH PACKAGER CAROUSEL STREAMING CDN
DIGITAL (MOBILE
SERVER
MEDIA CLIPS NETWORK)
VIDEO TAPE PUSH VOD OTT APP
BROADCASTER INGEST SERVER
CDN
(FIXED
HTML 5 NETWORK)
PUSH VOD PROVIDER
CONTENT VIDEO PLAYOUT
QUALITY SERVER OTHER DEVICES
CONTROL
OTT PROVIDER IOS
METADATA
CONTENT TELKOM
MHEG PROIVDER STORAGE MOBILE PC
SERVER
EPG WEB SERVER
HBBTV PROVIDER ANDROID
EPG TELKOM
READER DATA

EMM
BILLING CAS
CAROUSEL
TELKOM
SYSTEM PHONE LINE
PSTN

CRM SMS DRM SERVER

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 BACKGROUND FOR THE FUTURE:
MultiPlatform User Interface

• From a single Content Playout ingest source, Television and Radio content can be distributed across
different multi-screens (devices) – fulfilling viewers demands for ‘content everywhere, anytime and
on any devise’ – and enabling broadcasters to monetise these ‘eyeballs’ 24/7/365.

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 BACKGROUND FOR THE FUTURE:

The huge growth in the internet and mobile markets has afforded the consumer much more freedom in how they access their entertainment.
Advances in internet and mobile technologies have provided alternatives for TV and content delivery which has led to the convergence of
broadcasting and telecommunications sectors. Traditional Broadcasters and pay TV operators are being confronted with new competitors such
as telecom carriers in the IPTV space and Over the Top service (OTT) providers (e.g. Netflix, Youtube, Amazon and Hulu). Source: Internal
SENTECH documents.

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 BACKGROUND FOR THE FUTURE

According to Information Telecoms and Media forecasts (see Figure 5) there will be more than 1.8 billion devices (TVs,
Blu-ray players, Set-top boxes, game consoles and media streaming boxes), with internet connectivity in use in over 570
million homes by end 2016. Connected TV sets and already the best-selling internet-enabled TV devices with sales of
connected TV sets forecasted to more than double over the next 4 years to reach 227.3 million by 2016 worldwide. As
connected TVs become the norm, new forms of distribution such as viewing of time-shift/on-demand TV and video
streaming is expected to accelerate. The flooding of fully-connected TVs enable the OTT providers to deliver their content
direct to the device optimised for TV.

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 BACKGROUND FOR THE FUTURE

The technical environment to support the new connected

ecosystem becomes significantly more complex, requiring
a back to basics approach to systems design and
specification.

The Hybrid Broadcast Broadband TV (HbbTV)

specification for example makes an attempt to provide a
formalization that makes the best of already existing
formal methods in television, the Internet and consumer
devices.

OIPF = Open IPTV Forum; CEA = Consumer Electronics Association; DVB = Digital Video Broadcasting; 14
1 INTRODUCTION

2 SOME BACKGROUND

3 GLOBAL REFLECTIONS

4 SOUTH AFRICAN CONTEXT

5 SOME PRACTICAL POSSIBILITIES FOR THE FUTURE

 GLOBAL REFLECTIONS

Arbetis in Spain has implemented an HBBTV platform

that allows them to integrate a number of
communications services towards their broadcast and
media customers.

All converged services are provided under the cover of

the main brand.
1 INTRODUCTION

2 SOME BACKGROUND

3 GLOBAL REFLECTIONS

4 SOUTH AFRICAN CONTEXT

5 SOME PRACTICAL POSSIBILITIES FOR THE FUTURE

 SOME DATA:

Global IP Video Traffic

Trend
• By 2016 total traffic will be 4 times
larger than 2011.
Video Streaming: global IP traffic growth (monthly traffic PetaB)
• By 2016 Global Video Streaming 70.000
traffic will be equivalent to 37 M
60.000
DVDs/hour.
50.000
• The regions with higher potential of
40.000
growth are:
30.000
• Middle East and Africa that in
20.000
2016 will be 21 times what is
10.000
in 2011 and...
0
• Latin America with a growth 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016

around 11 times comparing North America

Latin America
Asia Pacific
Central & Eastern Europe
Westwern Europe
Middle East & Africa
2016 and 2011.
Source:: CISCO VNI Forecast (feb/2012)
• North America growth will be
practically stagnant from 2014.
• Western Europe traffic will grow
more than 4 times comparing 2016
and 2011.
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SOME DATA:

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1 INTRODUCTION

2 SOME BACKGROUND

3 GLOBAL REFLECTIONS

4 SOUTH AFRICAN CONTEXT

5 SOME PRACTICAL POSSIBILITIES FOR THE FUTURE

 THE FUTURE

• For SENTECH, our operational challenges require us to look quickly at the Open Access network
that is technology agnostic. Providing a ubiquitous service abstraction layer to the industry relevant
for applications and multi-platform environment.
• Avoidance of duplication in technology investments. The future in the digital world, is about the
efficiency in infrastructure deployment and service enablement based on infrastructure
sharing/collaboration.
• There lies an opportunity for new entrants and removal of barrier to entry in provision of services.
• Most importantly, the industry will need to take the policy makers and the regulator along so as to
avoid “rules being defined at the point of execution”.
• The real exciting future in convergence lies in the equilibrium of universal and affordable access to
services and applications, through a unified network approach.
• This will call for review of current legislative framework for ECNS, ECS and BS licensing categories
in Content Services, Multiplexing services and transmission facilities.

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