Virgin Media taps Harmonic for MPEG-DASH trial

UK cable operator Virgin Media will use video delivery infrastructure firm Harmonic to power its MPEG-DASH trial.

A live demo of the new Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (MPEG-DASH) protocol, using the Harmonic ProMedia Multiscreen Solutions is being displayed at ANGA COM this week.

Using Harmonic’s ProMedia Live real-time transcoder and ProMedia Package stream packager in its innovations research headend facility in London, Virgin Media aims to deliver more efficient and cost-effective high-quality broadcasts to TVs, PCs, tablets, smartphones, set-top boxes, and other IP-connected devices, Harmonic said.

Harmonic’s ProMedia Live transcodes MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 AVC H.264 content to multiple high-quality adaptive bit-rate streams optimised for the Virgin Media MPEG-DASH service.

“As part of an integrated headend solution, Harmonic’s ProMedia Suite optimises multiscreen delivery by eliminating the need to separately encode, encrypt, store, and transport each piece of video content to ensure compatibility with multiple HTTP delivery formats. The demo at ANGA COM will highlight the operational efficiencies achieved by implementing an MPEG-DASH-based workflow for next-generation multiscreen services converging on one ABR format, and unifying multiscreen delivery for tablets, PCs, and smartphones, in addition to set-top boxes and Smart TVs,” said Dale Barnes, director of advanced technologies and innovation at Virgin Media.

The MPEG-DASH workflow will be showcased at the Harmonic stand S10 located in Hall 10.1.