IntelsatOne IP, Creating Flexible Content Delivery
At IBC 2023, Intelsat showcased its new content distribution system, IntelsatOne IP. I recently talked to Pascale Fromont, Vice President and General Manager, Media Business at Intelsat to find out how customers will integrate this into their workflows.
Q: Can you provide an overview of the IntelsatOne IP Solution?
A: IntelsatOne IP is a flexible, secure content distribution system with monitoring and different protocols to ensure the secure transmission of the content over the public internet. It can be point-to-point, point-to-multipoint, multipoint-to-multipoint, so it is very flexible and it is all software based and global. We add this as a compliment to our existing portfolio of connectivity solutions. Today we have a fleet of geostationary satellites, we also have an extensive fiber network on the ground with 100,000 miles of fiber terrestrially and we have connections to various cloud providers. We are adding this as one more connectivity option to the portfolio, so we have the full suite whenever the customer has a requirement. We choose the best combination of technologies to fill in the requirements.
There is full visibility on how content is being moved from point A to point B, so we can really monitor the quality of the connection and the content that is being moved across the public internet, so it compliments what we have elsewhere.
What we are working on is a software defined engine that will combine all of these different connectivity solutions and will choose the best technology for the job. It might be a combination of technologies in some cases.
Q: Is the IntelsatOne IP service visible to the end user or does it run in the background?
A: No, with IntelsatOne IP our aim is to make it transparent to the end user. They essentially just provide a requirement, I want content to be moved from this place to all these different end points, and then we take care of applying the best technology for whatever SLA and price point they have in mind. This is deployed globally and adds greater flexibility for the customer.
Q: Could you provide some examples of how this would be implemented?
For instance let's say we have a customer who is doing distribution in all of Asia-Pacific and they also have a few distribution points in Latin America. Typically they would have a lot of distribution points, satellite makes a lot of sense because it is the most economical over a certain number of distribution points. But the satellite coverage is only Asia-Pacific, so if they have a few affiliates in Latin America, rather than having to pay for another additional satellite link or a very long fiber from Asia-Pacific to the Americas, then they would use this solution as a compliment to the distribution. In this example they would have the satellite link for the Asia-Pacific footprint and then they could use IntelsatOne IP to reach the takers outside of the footprint. This would be a common use case.
Another use case could be for a backup. A customer could be using a satellite or fiber link as a primary and the IntelsatOne IP link would be added as a second or even third leg to increase the SLA as a backup to the other connectivity options.
You can also use for not only distribution, but also for contribution. From a venue where an event takes place, you would have satellite or fiber as the primary and you would use our solution as a backup. Or maybe for Tier 3 / 4 events, such as College Football, then this could potentially be used as the primary solution, as the SLA requirements are not so high and this is a price sensitive market.
Q: Is the IntelsatOne IP solution available now or is it still to come to market?
A: Yes, the platform is live, but currently we do not have a service on it just yet. We are working on some proof of concepts with our customers at the moment. We launched this at IBC 2023 and we had a demo that we were running for customers that had a lot of interest.
Q: Do you see this being a staple part of your business going forward?
A: Yes we do. This is a response to customer demand and we see it more generally in the market. The protocols have really improved to a point where it has become more and more reliable. Initially when it was not reliable this was not something that we were willing to integrate into our portfolio but now it is we are willing to do this and see the customer demand. I think it has got its place and has its own value for certain use cases, price points, types of content. It may not be recommendable to use for Tier 1 events / sports where there is a lot of advertising and subscription revenue attached to high quality content but for either as a third leg backup or for lower tier content it is a great solution.
It also depends on the number of distribution points. There is definitely a tipping point where satellite makes more sense. Satellite is more economical when you go above a certain number of distribution points but for a smaller number, IntelsatOne IP can be a great solution.
Q: Could IntelsatOne IP also be used for data applications?
A: Data is sometimes comprised of video as well, so I’m sure it could be used in that context. I deal mostly with media content and services but in theory I can’t see why it couldn’t be applied to data. Usually if you can do it with video and media, you can do it with data as it is less demanding.
Q: With the recent announcement of your new facility in Brazil, does this fit into the IntelsatOne IP solution?
A: We are opening a new point of presence and teleport in Brazil. Those will definitely both be used for data services and media services. It is really extending the entire Intelsat terrestrial network into Brazil with a local presence. We already have a local entity and local office in Brazil, so we are adding this teleport and media point of presence so we exchange content with different local providers and take their content very easily on our network. It is like we are extending our network in Brazil, into Rio. This is fully open and operational and will be used for media customers. It will be one of the nodes for IntelsatOne IP, one of the nodes for our fiber network and we have also satellite infrastructure that can be used to uplink and downlink to assist in Brazil and Latin America, so it is going to be used for the entire Latin American continent.