Technology requirements in the media industry are constantly evolving and being updated. In such a fast-moving environment it is important that broadcast enterprises modernise content delivery workflows, in order to keep up with consumer expectations and demands. This is especially true for broadcasters, such as ITV, that deliver content to multiple platforms.
ITV is a vertically integrated producer broadcaster and streamer, consisting of ITV Studios and Media & Entertainment (M&E). ITV Studios is a diversified global production business which creates, owns and distributes high-quality scripted and unscripted content for broadcasters and platforms in the UK and internationally. Through M&E, we distribute content across our ad‑funded linear channels and ITVX, our new free ad-supported streaming platform. The integration of these two businesses has many advantages, including providing a base of core commissions for ITV Studios, being an attractive destination for talent and offering advertisers a unique opportunity to integrate their brand into our shows.
In 2010 ITV commenced with a major programme of content delivery and modernisation across its platforms. It wanted to utilise emerging technologies and modern file-based processes to improve efficiency, by overhauling the way the ITV delivers content to multiple platforms.
ITV originally outsourced to third-party delivery providers, and wanted to begin handling its content delivery in-house. This would enable its departments to manage costs and be responsive to external changes. ITV needed a flexible Media Asset Management (MAM) solution that offered the ability to scale with each new demand and that would support a fully integrated system.
In 2013 Cantemo was selected, combining the off-the-shelf product with custom development, to build a bespoke in-house MAM workflow for ITV. Cantemo is a time-based meta data driven, hybrid-cloud, MAM solution, that offers integrations with post-production workflows and a fully customisable user interface (UI). This flexibility, combined with Cantemo’s modern REST API were key factors in ITV’s choice to implement the MAM solution.ITV was able to automate numerous workflows, simplifying and streamlining many of its content delivery processes.
Cantemo utilises a range of open standard technologies to provide an environment that will be familiar to experienced system administrators and devops engineers. This meant the solution was a good fit for existing IT infrastructures and the toolset for augmenting functionality, or adding new features, could be easily adopted. Cantemo enabled ITV to increase content delivery from 20 hours of content to 4 platforms, to over 300 hours of content, on 30 different platforms across catch-up and archive each week.
By adopting Cantemo, ITV now has a modernised, centralised, and cost-effective media asset management system, customised to its unique requirements. ITV is able to access the solution from any modern web browser and easily customise its own UI, ensuring the workflow environment is user friendly and efficient. As ITV’s content modernisation project continues into a new phase, Codemill continues to provide system integration services and workflow guidance.
“It has become essential that media organisations take back control of their content management and delivery processes, and consolidate workflows into one intuitively designed interface. Cantemo continues to be a critical element within ITV’s ContentSupply & Distribution (CS&D) platform, to centrally manage their broadcast and VOD archive.”
Neil Anderson, CRO, Codemill
Cantemo MAM links islands of content, and integrates essential media processing tools. The system connects every step from ingest, through to content and metadata management, ready for media distribution. Find out more here: https://www.codemill.se/cantemo
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