To say the reaction to Harmonic’s contract upgrade at China Central Television (CCTV) this week was understated would itself be an understatement. China’s largest state TV broadcaster, a long term advocate of the US encoding expert, has rolled out Harmonic’s advanced media server for UHD playout over a footprint of more than 1 billion viewers. More than anything though, the deal signifies the dominance of US companies in the wider encoding market, in turn marking China’s increased reliance on this technology. It comes in stark contrast to the telecommunications sector right now, with US firms waging war on Chinese vendor Huawei, with western allies following suit. So, as well as powering most of CCTV’s 50 channels for its total viewership…