Cisco Launches Network Based Media Processing Platform For Video

Today, Cisco announced a new media media processing platform that provides media conversion, real-time post production, editing, formatting, and network distribution capabilities for formatting video and rich media on any device. The first product now offered for this new platform is dubbed the Cisco Media Experience Engine (MXE) 3000. A rack-mount device that delivers real-time post production and processing capabilities such as watermarking, voice and video editing, text and image overlays and noise reduction for creating customized broadcast quality video experiences.

The MXE supports file-to-file transcoding only, not real-time streaming, and supports H.264, QuickTime, MPEG1, MPEG2, AVI, Windows Media, VC-1 and H.264 as input formats and spits out video for MPEG2, MPEG4, H.264, AC-3 Audio, Layer II Audio, Windows Media Proxy, MPEG1 and MPEG 2 amongst others.

While not that impressive as just a stand alone transcoding solution, the unique aspect is that the MXE allows you to do complex video editing like stitch clips to form a single contiguous clip, make graphic overlays that include the addition of title slides, captions, logo insertions, watermarking and voice overlays. The graphics feature supports Flash 8 Pro template authoring and supports Web Services and XML APIs. The system also includes a ton of monitoring functions and pre-processing options.

This product announcement should come as no surprise to anyone since Cisco is hard at work to move the entire ecosystem of video creation, transcoding and delivery to the network layer and bundle more video functionality into all of their network based systems. Once these types of solutions can start doing things like transcoding and delivery in real-time, that should be a catalyst for the industry. That being said, with the economy being what it is today, Cisco is going to have a harder time in the near-term in selling such solutions unless the customer is able to save money in the long run by using just one platform.

No word yet on what the MXE costs but I will updated the post in a few hours when I hear back. Cisco says the list price of the unit is $65k.

Enterprise Video Market and Vendors Growing Nicely: VBrick Raises $11.9 Million

With all the talk of video in the broadcast and entertainment verticals, it seems that enterprise based video offerings are rarely written about anymore. I can't remember the last time I read a really in-depth article on video inside the enterprise. This is a shame as there are a lot of major video deployments and continued video adoption taking place within the enterprise market, inside the firewall.

As opposed to content delivery networks, who for the most part are focusing on just delivering bits, vendors offering products and services for enterprise video are tackling more complex issues like video content management, self-provisioned webcasting and other pieces of the entire video ecosystem.

One of these vendors, VBrick, announced this morning a new round of funding totaling $11.9M from existing investors, with room for a strategic investor in the future. VBrick has seen nice growth over the past few years and has shipped more than 40,000 products to more than 5,000 customers. While VentureBeat.com is reporting that VBrick "brought in $30 million in revenue last year", that number is a few years old and is low by more than 30%. While VentureBeat.com also says that Vbrick has "been helped along the way by a partnership with Akamai Technologies", Vbrick's "Broadcast" product uses multiple CDNs and they have had partnerships with Akamai, Limelight, PowerStream and others for many years now.

VBrick says the additional money raised will go towards continuing their growth and possible acquisitions as VBrick's target customer has quickly evolved from mid-sized companies and universities to major Fortune 500 corporations.

Google's New Business Video Offering Not A True Enterprise Product

On Tuesday, Google added video sharing to their paid business version of Google Apps calling the offering Google Video for Business. While some reviewers are calling it an "enterprise" video offering, it's not even close to being something a real enterprise company would use. While the definition of what classifies a company as an enterprise organization can be debated, the majority of users for Google Apps are not Fortune 500 corporations, which is what I classify as enterprise.

For what the product does, share videos inside a corporate network, it works well. But the idea that this is going to be a product to replace enterprise video offerings in the market is not the case and I'm surprised that Google would be quoted saying otherwise. Matthew Glotzbach, management director for Google Enterprise is quoted as saying, "video hasn’t been a big part of the enterprise space because the costs to build a video infrastructure behind a firewall are enormous." Say what? The enterprise market has been using and deploying online video since around 1996 and continues to build out their infrastructure as the costs are quite cheap for the value it brings. There are literally hundreds of examples and case studies of enterprise corporations who have been using online video for years.

Dave Girouard, president of enterprise, for Google is quoted as saying, "YouTube has enabled millions of consumers to easily capture and share video at an unprecedented level, yet corporate video has remained expensive and complicated." Corporate video is not expensive and complicated. Why is Google trying to make it sound like the enterprise market does not know what they are doing? Enterprise companies have been using video, and doing it well for many, many years. It's not hard to find use cases.

The key here is that Google Video is very limited collaboration tool, not a video distribution tool. It does not support live, has a cap on the file size, has very limited functionality and you can’t use it for sharing video with anyone who doesn't have log-in accounts on your Google Apps domain. Not to mention it has no real functionality for creating video, only sharing it. Some blogs I read are thinking Google now competes with Cisco's Enterprise TV offering or other true enterprise video platforms, which is not the case. Some are even comparing the Google offering to Brightcove, which baffles me as they are not even in the same ballpark in terms of functionality.

Another reason that enterprise companies won't use the service is that they won't trust Google. Some of the Enterprise companies I have asked about the service have already said they don't trust the same infrastructure that serves YouTube to deliver their content securely, let alone without buffering issues. I know that for me, many times it still takes ten or fifteen seconds for a clip on YouTube to start, even when the video is only thirty seconds in length. Other users are still having the same problems I have seen even since Google acquired YouTube.

The bottom line, Google's new video sharing functionality for business is an offering that will work well for it's sole purpose, limited video sharing. But please Google, don't try and make it sound like no one in the enterprise vertical was doing successful video delivery until YouTube came along. That's just not the case.

Enterprise Video Still Growing: Ecosystem and SaaS The Focus

While the news and media tend to focus mostly on consumer facing content because it is cool and sexy, the enterprise market continues to have very strong growth and demand for IP based video products and services. Webcasting platforms, capture cards, hardware encoders and content management systems, amongst others products, are still being bought and deployed across all enterprise-focused verticals. The nice thing about any vendor selling into the enterprise market is that they don't have to show customers how to monetize their content. Enterprise companies understand the value of the video ecosystem and know that using video for communications, marketing, and general business practices is just another business tool at their disposal.

I talk to a lot of enterprise companies each week and get to hear first hand how much video they are using, the products and services being deployed and what challenges they face when deploying video inside their network. If I had to estimate, about 10-15% of the readers to StreamingMedia.com are from the enterprise vertical, which I classify as Fortune 1000 companies who are not trying to monetize content. The one problem with the enterprise market is that historically, these companies are very quiet about giving out details on what they are doing, whom they use and the volume and growth they are seeing. I get a lot of details from them but rarely am able to share numbers and data, and in many cases, can't even use the company name. But rest assured, even with the economy being what it is today, they are still spending money for many of the products and services in the video ecosystem.

Whenever possible, StreamingMedia.com features case studies on some of these video deployments and we have a whole section on the site dedicated just to enterprise video. In the coming weeks, when we move our discussion lists over to an in-house web-based system, I will also be working hard to launch and build a new enterprise focused video discussion list. There is a lot taking place in the enterprise video market and we need a good forum to discuss what is taking place.

Speaking of enterprise video solutions, yesterday, video platform provider Qumu, formerly Media Publisher, announced it has raised $10.7 million in a series C round. To date, Qumu has raised just over $18 million since 2005. While Qumu is private and does not give out any details on revenue, I estimate they will do around $10 million for 2008. And last week, webcasting services company ON24 announced it had raised $8 million, bringing their total money raised to date to just over $46 million.

Amongst vendors who are selling into the enterprise market, the two biggest trends I am seeing them focus on is the entire ecosystem problem (capture, encode, manage, publish, deliver) and offering their web based platforms via software as a service (SaaS). Without a doubt, the hardest challenge for enterprise customers is the ecosystem since they tend to manage 100% of the workflow internally across their network. Vendors know this and have been working to solve this problem for some time. But the offering of their web based platforms on a SaaS model is pretty new. It is an interesting approach as many enterprise companies already buy other software services this way and typically it enables the customer to deploy and test the offering without having to spend a lot of money upfront.

I think it is too early to know if selling web based webcasting platforms via SaaS will be successful, but to date, companies who have been offering this to the market for a short time have said that they have started to see some traction from the model. Will be interesting to re-visit this topic a year from now and judge whether this new trend is really evolving with customers.

Job Titles Of Decision Makers For Online Video Products and Services

A lot of vendors ask me who they should be targeting when they are calling into companies looking for the decision maker or buyer of online video products and services. While many companies all have different folks who sign the contact, many people inside the organization tend to be involved in the decision making process, especially when you are selling into the enterprise or education markets.

Based on many of the job titles I see each day, here are the 50 most common titles I come across. While there are many more than these, it's a good start for someone new to the market or looking to spend marketing dollars specific to job titles.

• Senior Vice President, Digital Media Technology
• Director, Educational Technology & Distance Learning
• Senior Director Online Digital Properties
• Multi-Media Support Specialist
• Strategic Media Development
• Webcast Operations
• Multimedia Technologies Manager
• Academic Media Producer
• Streaming Project Development and Content Manager
• Digital A/V Production and Support Specialist
• Senior Manager, Digital Video Publishing
• Director Media Laboratory
• Director Advanced Media
• Rich Media Engineer
• Manager Digital Content Delivery
• New Media Product Manager
• Digital Media Solutions Manager
• Media Production Specialist
• Sr. Manager, Online Event Marketing
• Streaming Media Evangelist
• Lead Multimedia Engineer
• Streaming Media / Webmaster
• Distance Learning Specialist
• Live Events Producer
• Media Specialist Manager
• Director Of Technical Operations
• President of Digital Media Solutions
• Director Office of Information Technology
• Director of Digital Media Business Development
• Advertising Sales Digital Media
• VP of New Media
• VP of Creative Media Services
• Streaming Media Manager
• Director of Interactive Entertainment
• Director of New Media
• Digital Media and Entertainment Specialist
• VP Product and Technology
• Broadband Producer
• VP of CDN Services
• Technical Webcast Advisor
• VP of Media
• CTO and Executive Vice President
• VP of Technical Operations
• Managing Video Director
• Digital Program Manager
• Media Systems Engineer
• Senior Producer

Enterprise Speakers Wanted: Tools And Best Practices For The Enterprise Streaming Media Department

Jeff Hanley is moderating the "Tools And Best Practices For The Enterprise Streaming Media Department" panel at Streaming Media West this year and is currently selecting speakers. If you come from an enterprise company and would like to sit on a round table panel and talk about the video market in the enterprise vertical, please let me know and I will put you in touch with Jeff.

We are not accepting any vendor speakers for this session but do welcome any vendor who may have an enterprise customer that they want to get on the panel. I define enterprise as a Fortune 500 company. In the past such enterprise speakers have included Accenture, Bank Of America, MasterCard, Wachovia, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Lehman, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer, Microsoft, Target, Vanguard Group, JPMorganChase, Verizon, General Mills and many others.

Thursday, November 8, 2007
11:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m. B302 (Panel Session)

Tools And Best Practices For The Enterprise Streaming Media Department
This session will bring together four frontline streaming media professionals to discuss their favorite toolsets and techniques for producing enterprise communications and training content. The emphasis will be on in-house production with "off-the-shelf" tools and apps, rather than turnkey or outsourced solutions. Premiere or Final Cut Pro? Camtasia or Captivate? Flash or Silverlight? Or all of the above? What works and what should be avoided? All this and more will be covered in this enterprise-focused session.

Looking For Bloggers To Write About Online Video

Ok, so I'll put my money where my mouth is so to speak. If you are interested in doing a blog about some facet of the online video industry, we'll setup the blog for you, drive traffic to it, promote it on StreamingMedia.com AND sell sponsorships and ads on the blog and split the revenue with you. All you have to do is blog, which is enough work by itself. I'll even blog with you on your site to start.

We can get you the traffic if you can provide the content. While I am open to all ideas, in particular I want to start blogs on enterprise video, mobile video, webcasting and P2P video. I own domains already like p2pvideoblog.com, enterprisevideoblog.com, webcastingblog.com etc... and you can use one of them if you so choose.

So that's about as easy as I can make it. You'll get a login to TypePad and can just blog, we'll do all the rest. If you are serious about it, please contact me.

Unique Challenges To Enterprise Video Communications

For the dinner event that I am moderating tonight, talking to video in the enterprise and hosted by Ignite Technologies, what questions or topics do you think we should discuss? While I am not creating a huge list of points as I want to keep the topic open and free-flowing, here are the few I am interested in discussing:

• how is the enterprise market learning from what is taking place with video outside of the enterprise industry?
• what are the biggest headaches you face when it comes to implementing the entire ecosystem that makes up enterprise video?
• how much convincing of management is still needed when it comes to getting budget to buy and deploy enterprise video products and services and what are some of the best ways you prove internally the value that video provides?
• how do you evaluate products and services in the market and what factors do you use to decide what solutions you purchase?

Are there any questions that you would add to the list or any topics you'd like me to bring up so that you can hear the attendees take on the subject?

Cisco To Buy WebEx For 3.2 Billion Dollars: Will Video Now Be Added?

Cisco announced today that they have agreed to acquire WebEx Communications for 3.2 billion dollars. While we have all used the WebEx platform many times, personally, I was never impressed with it and I think the value Cisco paid is completely overpriced. For starters, WebEx did $380 million dollars in revenue last year so Cisco is valuing WebEx at almost nine times revenue. This from a product that barely even supports any video functionality but is suppose to be thought of as the tool for on demand collaboration.

Cisco said they were acquiring WebEx because "...companies are looking for rich communications tools to help them work more effectively and efficiently." No argument there, but does a tool set that includes almost no option for live video and very limited functionality for linking to on demand videos classify as a real "rich communication" tool? I guess to some people it does, but I'd classify a system that focuses on video, like a Tandberg system real rich communication before I would WebEx. I know, Tandberg tends to be more of a point-to-point system as opposed to the WebEx platform but even the WebEx solution is operated across their private network. So the two are very similar in many ways, except one makes video a core component of their offering.

With the acquisition, I'd like to see Cisco add a lot of video functionality to the WebEx product line for real collaboration in live and on demand presentations and increase the size of the audience that can come to a WebEx, which currently is very limited. If they can do that, I think Cisco can be very successful with this application in the small and medium sized business market.

Are there any features or functionality in the current WebEx system that you think are missing?

Former VP of Broadcast & Streaming Media for JPMorganChase For Hire

If you are looking to hire someone who has hands-on experience with the entire webcasting workflow process, Nico Mclane is someone you should talk to. Until last week, Nico was the VP of Broadcast and Streaming Media for JPMorganChase. Over the past seven years at JPMorganChase, she helped build, deploy and manage their internal webcasting solution including the hardware, software, distribution, A/V production, web developers etc...saving the company an estimated $3M is communication costs in 2006.

I have known Nico for many years and would vouch for her experience in the webcasting market. If you are looking for someone with her expertise, contact her directly.

If you are looking for a new position, have taken a new job or are a company that has a job opening, let me know. In many cases I will highlight it here on the blog - free of charge.