Ooyala Fuels Global Standardization for Live Digital Broadcasting with New Innovations in Video Personalization, Discovery and Monetization

Ooyala Discovery and Ooyala Now tap big data analytics to improve engagement, measurement and revenue

AMSTERDAM and MOUNTAIN VIEW, CALIF. (07 Sep 2012)

 

At IBC2012 (International Broadcasting Convention) in Amsterdam, Ooyala announced the commercial release of several new technology and analytics offerings for video streaming, personalization, discovery and monetization. Optimized for large-scale media companies, broadcasters and content aggregators, these include Ooyala Discovery for increasing viewer engagement, Ooyala Now for superior, up-to-the-second analysis of viewer behavior across multiple devices and properties, a new HTML5 player for improved publishing and performance on iOS, Android and Windows 8 devices and live in-stream ad insertion for maximizing revenue with live video.

Ooyala will be demonstrating its new offerings at IBC2012 in booth #14.100 in hall 14 of the RAI in Amsterdam. Bismarck Lepe, cofounder and president of products for Ooyala, will be further discussing these topics with executives of Sony Pictures, The Associated Press and others in the IBC2012 session "How Live Content is Making its Way to All Your Devices" on Saturday, September 8 from 16:00 to 17:30 CEST.

“The ubiquity of connected devices and the emergence of new sources of premium content are driving a continued disruption in video distribution, and creating enormous opportunity for digital publishers,” said Lepe. “For big media companies, we see a universal need for better engagement, measurement and ultimately monetization. Based upon successful pre-release trials and early wins, Ooyala Discovery and Ooyala Now are already setting the standard for deeper, more immediate business insights around how, when and why viewers are engaging. We’re turning these insights into new revenue for our publishers.”

Ooyala Discovery: Increasing Monetization through Higher Engagement
Proven in pre-release trials to drive significantly higher engagement – as measured by the number of videos played and the time spent within a particular viewing experience – Ooyala Discovery becomes commercially available today. It enables video content providers to increase view-related revenue by algorithmically recommending highly relevant content within the Ooyala Player, with nearly limitless integration opportunities via powerful APIs. On average, pre-release customers of Ooyala Discovery saw a 60% increase in engagement with their video content.

Ooyala Discovery leverages in-depth consumer behavioral data from nearly 200 million viewers across the web, combined with content metadata and other inputs, to recommend subsequent videos from large content libraries that viewers are most likely to watch. Ooyala’s content discovery engine applies real-time analytics processing to these and dozens of other inputs to provide a continuous stream of content recommendations that are locally, personally and socially relevant. By integrating these recommendations seamlessly with the playback experience, Ooyala helps publishers maximize revenue opportunities from advertising, video-on-demand or paywall transactions.

Ooyala Now: Real-Time Insights for Monetization
Optimized for TV programmers and publishers with large globally distributed audiences, Ooyala Now will be commercially available this month, driving greater visibility into consumption patterns that inform revenue-optimizing decisions. Ooyala Now is a real-time dashboard providing network-wide, up-to-the-second analysis of viewer engagement and content trends. It monitors every video play within seconds of being viewed and returns immediate insights that enable publishers to better monetize their inventory.

Ooyala Now data is presented in a simple, easy-to-use interface, including metrics such as trending and popular content, real-time viewing statistics for each asset and global content consumption patterns. Ooyala Now is the first of several analytics products to be delivered on a new platform designed to analyze data and produce insights within seconds across millions of subscribers accessing the content across the network.

Ooyala Now insights allow publishers to discover the viral potential of any piece of content and make editorial decisions about content placement within a website or application, unlocking revenue that might otherwise been lost.

Ricky Sutton, head of video, new devices and .tv network for Fairfax Media, one of the Asia-Pacific’s top multi-platform media companies, said, "Ooyala Now is the video analytics solution that provides a comprehensive view of engagement across all of our properties in real time. The ability to monitor and react to trends is key to maximizing revenues while delivering the most immersive consumer experience."

HTML Player Simplifies Plug-In Development
In addition to the commercial release of Ooyala Discovery and Ooyala Now, the company released several other new offerings, including a fast new HTML5 player and live in-stream ad insertion. The new HTML5 player delivers a rich mobile publishing and playback experience for non-flash environments prominent in smartphones and tablets. New CSS-based user interface customization enables greater control for modifying the player and controls.

Additionally, the new HTML5 player makes it easy for third parties to build plug-ins using standard web technologies, for deployment across a broader number of devices inclusive of those powered by iOS, Android, Blackberry OS 7.1 and higher, Blackberry Playbook, Kindle Fire, Windows Phone 7 and higher, Windows 8 Metro and Windows Tablets.

Live In-Stream Ad Insertion
Ooyala has also enabled frame-accurate, seamless insertion of ads and slates for delivery to multiple devices. This new slate insertion technology enables greater monetization of mid-roll advertising in both live and VOD content, allowing publishers to trigger ads via dynamic broadcast cue tones to ensure that ads are inserted at the right moment, consistent with the broadcast TV experience.  New server-side ad stitching helps off-load ad networks from large spikes in ad calls to avoid player buffering.  Finally, Ooyala also now handles inserting ads in both Flash (HDS) and iOS (HLS) streams for consistent display across devices, and provides automatic fallback to customer-provided slates in case no ad is available.

About Ooyala

Ooyala delivers personalized video experiences across all screens and is the leader in online video management, publishing, analytics and monetization. Ooyala’s integrated suite of technologies and services give content owners the power to expand audiences through deep insights that drive increased viewer engagement and revenue from video.

Companies using Ooyala technology include Telstra, ESPN, Pac-12 Enterprises, Miramax, Bloomberg, Telegraph Media Group, Tennis Australia, The North Face, Rolling Stone, Dell, Sephora and Yahoo! Japan. Headquartered in Mountain View, California, Ooyala has offices in Los Angeles, New York City, London, Sydney and Guadalajara, Mexico; and the company works with premier reseller and technology partners throughout the Americas, Europe, Africa, Japan and the Asia-Pacific region. For more information visit www.ooyala.com.