In Broadcast - April 2018 - 23

23

www.inbroadcast.com | Vol: 8 - Issue 4 | April 2018

InForm

Evaluating Multi-Vendor Versus
Single Vendor Approaches For
Your OTT Service

One seamless video platform, such as the NeuLion Digital Platform, provides
a major advantage when it comes to distributing and monetising OTT content...

O

ne of the biggest decisions
businesses face when rolling
out new services is whether to use a
single, end-to-end platform vendor
or a multi-vendor approach. When it
comes to video solutions, though, the
benefits of an end-to-end platform
outweigh
the
disadvantages,
making it the preferred choice of
many companies. There are a few
reasons why:
Reduced Complexities
One of the biggest advantages of
an end-to-end platform is increased
compatibility.
Using
a
multivendor approach, there's always
the possibility - and sometimes
the inevitability - that individual
components or solutions will be
incompatible with one another.
Even worse, as video technologies
continue to evolve and mature,
companies juggling multiple vendors
may find themselves using a mishmash
of products and services that don't
support seamless integration.
In contrast, by using an end-to-end
approach, companies can ensure
maximum compatibility, offering a
consistent, streamlined array of video
features to their customers.
Innovation
All too often, multi-vendor approaches
rely on products and services that
were created with a specific project
in mind. This can lead to services
that may perform one task very well,
but fall behind in other tasks, lack
key features, or is incompatible with
alternative video formats.
Further, companies taking a multivendor approach must have employees
or third parties manually connect or
map data between respective product
components, which can be extremely
time consuming (we will touch upon
this below). Taking a single vendor
approach, gives you the flexibility for
agile development and the ability to
move quickly on new projects.

NeuLion Digital Platform

Streamlined Workflows
The management of video services
is complicated. Customers using a
multi-vendor approach often find
themselves overwhelmed by these
challenges. With an end-to-end
solution, however, the workflow
becomes the responsibility of the
platform provider, who has the single
focus of delivering high-quality video
services.
Companies using an end-to-end
approach can leave the technical
aspects
of
multi-platform
management and support to their
platform provider and instead focus on
delivering great, high-quality content
to customers, regardless of the devices
they use.
Companies no longer have to worry
about writing code or creating
interfaces between each component.
End-to-end solutions result in an
improved video workflow. Too
often with multi-vendor strategies,
valuable time and resources can be
spent just trying to make various
parts of the process work smoothly,
even when there are seemingly no
inherent incompatibilities. Different
development processes, backgrounds,
and goals can result in wildly different
approaches to various steps, making it
harder for your company to focus on
what's really important.

With an end-to-end solution, every
step of the process shares a common
lineage, making it much easier to
establish effective, streamlined
workflows - no headaches or
misunderstandings involved.

time-to-market with new features and
abilities, helping you stay competitive
and take advantage of new
opportunities. In short, end-to-end
solutions save you - and, by extension,
your customers - money.

Time-to-Market
& Reduced Costs
With an end-to-end solution,
you don't have to spend time
negotiating individual video and
software licensing agreements.
Even more, your IT department
doesn't have to spend precious
time and resources integrating and
supporting various components and
services.
For example, the process of
integrating data either manually
or programmatically is often very
time consuming. Best of all, this
streamlined process greatly speeds up

Choose The Right Platform
Of course, your company won't reap
any of the benefits of a single vendor
approach unless you choose the right
end-to-end solution. Unlike many
companies in the industry, NeuLion
offers a true end-to-end platform, the
NeuLion Digital Platform - one that
doesn't rely on any third-party vendors
and components - One Platform.
One Provider. One Powerful Service.
We provide our customers with a
seamless video platform, giving them
a major advantage when it comes
to distributing and monetising their
content.

E-book: The Key Questions...

T

he sports and entertainment
media industry is operating in
a world of unprecedented customer
choice, competition, and complexity
of delivery. Today's technology and
adapting consumer habits are enabling
this constant change like never before.
New business models - like direct to
consumer (D2C) streaming - are being
enabled by new technologies. OTT
services are popping up everywhere,
now ultimately giving consumers more
choices in the content they consume
and how they consume it.
In this rapidly changing environment
one key question arises: should I build
my OTT service with multiple vendors

or buy a managed service with one
vendor?
In the e-book, you'll discover:
* The components needed
to deliver a successful,
interactive OTT service;
* The approach:
multi-vendor vs single vendor;
* How to reduce and/or
eliminate complexities;
* The benefits of buying into
a managed service.
For more information about evaluating
the multi-vendor vs. single vendor
approaches, download the e-Book,
Does Your OTT Service Have Too Many
Moving Parts?
http://www.inbroadcast.com https://www.neulion.com/ http://go.neulion.com/Managed-Services-Whitepaper_NL_Web
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of In Broadcast - April 2018
