A+E Networks EMEA has selected Arqiva to provide on-demand content for the channel’s Amazon Prime on demand service in Germany and UK.
A+E Networks EMEA, has been an Arqiva customer for over a decade, with the existing partnership spanning playout and connectivity across Africa and the Middle East, UK DTH satellite capacity and on-premise VOD processing services across EMEA (including the UK).
As part of the new contract, Arqiva will manage the content processing, packaging and delivery of A+E Networks EMEA existing archive content in both UK and Germany, from where it is currently stored on Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) and Amazon Simple Storage Service Glacier, to Amazon Prime.
One of A+E Networks EMEA’s key requirements was for the solution to be able to process all VOD requests as close to the cloud-based archive as possible in order to minimise content movement and therefore avoid costly cloud egress into on-premise data centres. Based on its latest hybrid on-premise/cloud offering, the solution implemented by Arqiva is the first to feature a completely cloud-contained journey, where content is taken from the online archive, processed packaged and delivered to Amazon Prime. This not only ensures significant cost-savings but transcoding in the cloud using AWS Elemental MediaConvert also enables Arqiva to process more simultaneous jobs at a far quicker pace.
Matt Westrup, VP Technology and Operations at A+E Networks EMEA, said: “In a very dynamic and competitive media environment the ability to quickly and seamlessly deliver an even broader range of A+E Networks EMEA’s premium content to our Amazon Prime audience is a real strategic advantage. A solution like this means we can effortlessly build on our broadcast heritage in a viable way.”
Alex Pannell, Commercial Director Video Channels at Arqiva, said: “This deal marks a really important milestone for Arqiva. A+E Networks Germany is the first customer to use our new cloud VoD solution and its feedback on both the platform and onboarding process has been fantastic. We’ve been working really hard to extend our broadcast products onto cloud infrastructure and have built up an extensive set of skills and experience building on AWS. We see the fact that a major multi-channel broadcaster has adopted the cloud for its content archive as clear proof this was the right strategy to pursue for the future.”
