French CDN technology provider Broadpeak has announced it will launch its new multiple CDN product at next week’s NAB show in Las Vegas, called CDN Diversity – a product which could have the potential to provide some major improvements for operators and content providers in regions renowned for having slow networks or outages.
CDN Diversity, as part of its umbrellaCDN line, enables pay TV operators and content providers to switch content delivery between multiple CDNs, based on which networks are performing the most efficiently; accounting for factors such as location, price, and QoS. Broadpeak says by accessing data from its video analytics system, users of CDN Diversity will be able to gain an insight into the consumer experience – from where metrics can be accordingly adjusted, improving the overall QoE for end users.
If one CDN provider’s network goes down, CDN Diversity will be able to re-route traffic through a different CDN provider, and if a certain region has multiple providers, then Broadpeak says it can select the one performing the fastest.
Broadpeak also says it can pick the appropriate CDN based on the pricing limits of CDN Diversity customers. On the content security side of things, Broadpeak cites that CDN Diversity is compatible with all DRM and CDN security features.
“For content providers, delivering video with premium quality — in the most affordable manner possible — is the ultimate goal. Yet, one CDN is not always the best choice for all content delivery scenarios. CDN Diversity innovates upon the traditional CDN selection process, allowing providers to make immediate, intelligent, and automated decisions depending on the context of various networks, subscribers, and their devices,” said Jacques Le Mancq, CEO at Broadpeak.
Similarly, Broadpeak’s nanoCDN offering is a method to switch between unicast and multicast streams nearer the network edge, in order to deliver video to screens more efficiently.
Earlier this month, Broadpeak won a contract with Mauritius-based operator Emtel to deploy its nanoCDN multicast ABR technology – delivering live multiscreen services through its fiber-through-the-air (FTTA) network. Broadpeak and Emtel claim this is the first deployment of its kind by a telecom and mobile operator.
Broadpeak also has installations at Romania’s RomTelekom, Maxxcom in Mexico, TCC in Uruguay, Discover Digital in South Africa, Bouygues in France, StarHub in Singapore, D-Smart Turkey, Síminn in Iceland, Telecom Argentina, and Mobily in Saudi Arabia. It also recently added deals with fiber operator Zeop, based on the French-owned Reunion Island, and South African digital entertainment company Discover Digital.
However, the Rennes-based vendor is yet to crack the crowded market in North America and from what we can see has just the one contract in South East Asia with StarHub – although it did carry out some 4K delivery trails with Chunghwa Telecom in Taiwan back in 2014, but nothing more seemed to come of this collaboration. Competing with the likes of Akamai, Level 3, and Limelight is no easy feat, and with some of the bigger operators increasingly looking to invest in in-house systems, this could cause additional problems for CDN technology suppliers.