By Andre Christensen
OTT magic happens when customer vision gets together with the power of the cloud. That came through loud and clear at the Asia Pacific Broadcasting Awards dinner late last week in Singapore.
With India’s aha and the Philippines’ Cignal TV capturing Excellence Awards for Cloud-Native Platforms, the event was a signal to the entire OTT industry of how innovative spirit and a superior platform are conjuring up digital transformation across the APAC region and beyond.
Let’s say right here that we weren’t surprised by either honor. If our close partnerships with the two companies have taught us anything, it’s that both recognize how breaking free of the shackles of legacy architectures and embracing cloud-native platforms can materialize whole new sets of business and market goals.
In aha’s case, new services and features that are core to its “glocal” strategy have appeared with amazing speed. Like a quick-change artist, aha morphed its original Telugu app to a cloud-based aha 2.0 in just months, added a new Tamil service just three months later, and received rave reviews when Disney+ Hotstar and aha aired the same blockbuster film simultaneously. aha has since added games and other new capabilities and continues to pursue audience engagement and new markets.
Cignal TV’s abracadabra moment came last fall: migration of its Cignal Play service to a cloud-native app in a scant three months and – voila! – a near doubling within five days of its Google Play store rating, to 4.3 stars from 2.3. Next up are delivery of its Cignal Play service to living rooms through smart devices as well as the Philippines’ first and only sports app for Filipino fans worldwide.
aha and Cignal TV are making success look easy. What they have up their sleeves is our flexible, extensible and highly scalable platform – not to mention our expertise from launching more than 50 services worldwide – that gives them the tools they need to make their visions come alive. We help them get to market faster and more efficiently, and to make changes or even launch new services in days or weeks, instead of months and years. And our Video Pipeline, Video CMS and User Experience capabilities are underpinned by data science that provides the analytics and insights needed to drive customer engagement and monetization.
There’s no mystery or illusion about how we help our customers. Our platform is making cloud transformation happen not only across the APAC region, but around the world. Our work with YES Network, MSG Networks and Rogers Sports & Media’s Sportsnet is changing the way sports connects with fans. With Allen Media Group, we’re leading the charge for personalized FAST channels that are the new “front porch” of OTT. And don’t take your eye off the ball, because there’s more to come.
But for now, let’s give credit where it’s due: to aha, Cignal TV and their innovation magicians. They’ve turned their platforms into ultrapowerful forces that are winning customers, building success and transforming OTT before our very eyes.
