Advanced Television

Metrological Streamlines Premium OTT Apps for TV Operators

December 28, 2016

Metrological today announced a new method for operators to deploy premium OTT content on set-top boxes (STBs). By using cloud-based frameworks and standardised key components, operators can streamline premium OTT integrations and speed up time to market. Liberty Global, the largest international TV and broadband company in the world, is the first to implement Metrological’s approach for its Netflix rollout.

“At Metrological, our focus is to reduce the complex engineering and to introduce lifecycle management of premium OTT content. This enables our customers to focus on the viewer experience instead of the technical integration,” said Jeroen Ghijsen, CEO of Metrological. “By leveraging our experience with browser-based application frameworks, we have standardised key components, simplifying the integration of premium OTT content. This results in a reduction of the required STB resources, deployment cost and time to market. Both Liberty Global as well as Netflix benefit.”

Metrological defined a hybrid deployment architecture, leveraging an application framework that acts as a device and software agnostic abstraction layer streamlining the engineering and coding requirements for STBs. This approach also yields a smaller STB resource footprint, enabling operators to deploy premium OTT content on legacy devices.

Key aspects that have been addressed include:

  • Simplified player abstraction;
  • Security and provisioning;
  • Code streamlining, reducing the overall footprint and resource consumption; and
  • Lifecycle and application management.

“Metrological’s Application Platform, which is an integral part of Horizon TV, helped us to streamline this particular Netflix deployment and expedite the time to market,” said Doron Hacmon, Chief Product Officer, Liberty Global. “The flexibility of the platform allows us to continue to innovate by integrating new relevant services in a timely fashion.”

Liberty Global has already launched the Netflix app in the UK, Ireland, Switzerland and The Netherlands, which will be followed by other countries throughout 2017.

Metrological’s Application Platform integrates TV and OTT experiences with full lifecycle support for TV app stores and OTT content. Operators are able to manage their branded TV app store via a cloud-based back-end that also provides real-time business intelligence data and marketing analytics. Operators have access to Metrological’s App Library, which contains over 300 apps, or build their own apps with an open software development kit.

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