How to target low latency for undisrupted experiences

As live sports content returns to its regularly scheduled programming, the last thing viewers want is to finally tune into their favorite games only to be met with endless delays or lags in content. One of the best parts of these exciting events is the sense of unity that comes with watching them together with friends and family, bringing the social aspect of the arena into your home.

With the energizing intensity of the UEFA European Championship and Tokyo Olympics this summer and the anticipation of the upcoming NFL season in the US, the desire to see the action before, or at the same time, as others is even more prevalent now.

Viewers around the world count on these unified and undisrupted experiences. Consequently, it has never been more crucial for OTT providers to ensure they have the capabilities they need to match the lowest latency between broadcast and OTT, and so minimize content disruptions.

And that assurance comes through work with best-in-class technology partners.

What can we do to help ensure viewers aren’t watching a frame on their screen that’s seconds, or even up to a minute, behind the actual live event? It’s key to offer OTT and MVPD providers the technology that will target lower latency times, which will in turn minimize the delays their viewers experience – seconds may not feel like a long time, but avid sports fans know that every second makes all the difference, especially when one goal or one play can win the game.

In the middle of an intense game, viewers definitely do not want to hear their neighbours yelling “goal” seconds before they see it on their screen themselves.

At Synamedia, we are leading the way in offering video service providers a true, end-to-end video network portfolio, with the capability to minimize latency and match broadcast latency. Our award-winning video network portfolio includes a cloud-ready, converged broadcast and broadband end-to-end ATSC 3.0 solution as well as a next generation OTT platform.

One strong example of our technology supporting low latency initiatives is through our work with a pay-TV innovator who, in part by deploying our end-to-end video network portfolio, can now offer broadcast-equivalent latency for its cloud-based, internet-only TV services.

This deployment reduced latency from minutes to just seconds, a testament to our commitment to providing an undisrupted and unified viewing experience. With Synamedia’s virtualized Digital Content Manager (DCM, encoder, packager and origin) and Edge Media Streamer private CDN to achieve ultra-low latency, this customer now has far greater control over service quality, costs and operations than a public CDN.

And what’s most important about this deployment? Improved viewer experiences. Viewers are no longer subjected to buffering because they’re now tapping into high-quality experiences. So now shouting “goal!” can confidently be done in unison.

To find out more on how Synamedia can help video service providers with cost-efficient low latency for OTT video streaming read our whitepaper.