Carriers look to optimization technologies to fight mobile video data crunch

As an increasing number of customers use their mobile handsets to watch online video, carriers are starting to move to new video optimization technologies for higher quality streaming. Patrick Lopez, chief marketing officer at Vantrix Corp., a Montreal video-optimization software company, said the technology is fairly new, rising in awareness early last year. Lopez said the use of video optimization technology is part of a larger trend in the industry as carriers around the world struggle with bandwidth capacity issues. It’s a problem particularly for providers in Europe and the United States that offer unlimited data plans. Users can access as many videos as they like and the carriers can’t recover necessary costs to invest in their networks. “The networks are not designed to accommodate all that demand,” Lopez said. Most Canadian carriers have refrained from offering unlimited data plans, but they still face bandwidth issues. Up to 50 per cent of network traffic is derived from video, traffic that is set to double every year, Lopez said. Yet, he pointed out, it is practically impossible for a service provider to double its network capacity year after year. Some mobile operators will alleviate bandwidth issues with new, faster, and more efficient LTE technologies. Bell Canada Enterprises Inc. and Rogers Communications Inc. said last year they were testing the technology. But in its predictions for 2011, Deloitte recently said most carriers won't upgrade to LTE this year unless they have to. Ron Gruia, principal telecom analyst at Frost & Sullivan in Toronto, said that, increasingly, it looks like customers’ access to mobile video will come at a price. Carriers are considering tiered pricing, whereby users comfortable with lower-quality video streams on their handsets pay a lower price and customers seeking a superior video experience pay more. “Don’t expect to get an improvement in quality without paying more than you’re paying today,” Gruia said. “It’s not going to happen.” Pierre Roy, vice-president of research and development at Quebec wireless provider Videotron Ltd., owned by Quebecor Media Inc., said the company tries to simplify the mobile video experience using prices and technology. Videotron prices its mobile data services according the amount of time the user spends online rather than the amount of data downloaded. It’s easier for customers to understand time-based pricing than megabit pricing, Roy said. Videotron also uses Vantrix’s software for video optimization. Roy said the technology monitors the amount of bandwidth available on the network and streams the content at the best bit rate possible. Users get smooth, uninterrupted video streams, even when bandwidth capacity is shifting, he said. Roy said Videotron opted for Vantrix’s software because the carrier needed a way to ensure customers could access video content associated with Quebcor’s television channels. Since its wireless launch last September, Videotron has been trying to distinguish itself as the service provider with the best video content. Roy said the software also addresses situations where customers in the same location try to access the same video feed, such as a hockey highlight, at the same time. “We are able to provide much more simultaneous users a high-quality stream because there’s network adaption,” Roy said. When asked whether Videotron’s use of video optimization technology will enable the company to adjust its mobile data prices, he said the software is intended to address the quality of the video streams, not pricing. Complicating matters is a battle brewing in the Internet standards arena. While many technology companies have embraced the H.264 video compression protocol, Google Inc. this month announced that its Chrome web browser will no longer support H.264. Instead, Google is backing its own WebM compression technology. (Vantrix offers a video optimization technology, which works in a separate process.) News reports say that Google and other companies chafe at the licensing fees they pay H.264’s patent holders, which include competitors Apple Inc. and Microsoft Corp. It’s a compression contretemps, and it appears a showdown is looming. “The standard that’s the most ubiquitous will be the one to prevail,” Gruia said, adding that it’s too soon to say if Google or H.264 will win. In the meantime, mobile handset manufacturers and providers may need to load devices with multiple web browsers so that end users can access video websites running either H.264 or WebM technology, Gruia said. news@thewirereport.ca

Carriers look to optimization technologies to fight mobile video data crunch

Broadcast | January 28, 2011

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