Beamr, a staple of the video compression technology scene since 2009, is seeking pastures new. No one should be shocked, given the well-documented troubles of the traditional media and entertainment industry, though Beamr was sure to remind us at IBC 2026 that Netflix has renewed its contract for the company’s content-adaptive bitrate (CABR) software for the 9th consecutive year. The latest pitch is not really about making video look better for humans, as is the typical perceptual quality story for Beamr. Instead, Beamr’s researchers are exploring how to make video small enough for machines to digest it without screwing up what those machines think they are seeing, in layman’s terms. Extending beyond its traditional M&E customer base, Beamr is well on the path towards computer vision and, ultimately, autonomous vehicles. Beamr provides ML-Safe video data compression technology designed to reduce the massive storage and networking costs generated by autonomous vehicle…