NEWS

Bitmovin and Yospace launch live streaming partnership for world-class advertising experience

Mar 14, 2024

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3

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Bitmovin, a leading provider of video streaming infrastructure, today announces its partnership with Yospace, the dynamic ad insertion expert. The partnership will deliver a joint solution for live streaming, at scale, to empower broadcasters to offer better ad solutions to brands and advertisers, with the reassurance of a seamless customer experience. Bitmovin and Yospace’s solution will debut at NAB Show 2024 on Bitmovin’s stand (booth #W3013) and Yospace’s stand (booth #W2243).

Bitmovin and Yospace’s shared goal is to optimize the quality of experience for live-streaming audiences whilst ensuring publishers and advertisers can provide the highest level of advertising experience. Resilience at scale is key for live streaming and creates challenges for broadcasters, but by ensuring that Yospace’s Server Side Ad Insertion (SSAI) is compatible with Bitmovin’s Live Encoder, they can deliver unbreakable, high-quality, live streaming experiences with uninterrupted ad integration. The Bitmovin Live Encoder processes SRT or Zixi inputs and outputs HLS, subsequently allowing Yospace to work with its Ad Platform partner to insert live advertisements using HLS manifests. 

Stefan Lederer, CEO and co-founder at Bitmovin said: ”Live streaming is the apple of the consumer’s eye, and this has expanded beyond sports. What we have found is that for live streaming, quality is everything. Audiences are happy with a small delay to their live stream as long as the quality is as high as possible, without any interruptions or buffering. Whilst others may chase down the lowest possible latency, at Bitmovin, we want to provide the ultimate viewing experience that delivers a high-quality video to make audiences feel a part of the action. In the new streaming era, this includes seamless advertising.”

The fact that the record for concurrent live audiences was broken five times last year demonstrates how rapidly live streaming is growing in demand. In terms of demonstrating the scale of these live events, the recent NFL wildcard playoff game between Kansas City Chiefs and Miami Dolphins was the first to be carried out-of-market exclusively by a streaming platform - Peacock. Peacock recorded its largest single-day audience with 16.5 million concurrent devices, and the game averaged 26.3 million viewers across Peacock, local NBC stations, and NFL+. 

With years of experience and know-how, Yospace’s SSAI aligns itself with Bitmovin’s dedication to quality, having delivered major events successfully for over a decade, including five Fifa World Cups, five Olympic games, and 800+ UEFA Champions League games. Publishers and advertisers have no margin for error when it comes to live advertising and viewer experience. 

Yospace CEO, Tim Sewell added: ”Live events have the power to tap into an audience's collective imagination and create water-cooler conversations that advertisers love but are struggling to find anywhere else. The combination of Bitmovin's Live Encoder and Yospace's SSAI creates a very powerful advertising proposition for broadcasters, who can tap into that unique value of live events and maximize advertising revenues at scale”.

About Yospace

Yospace is the foremost provider of server-side ad insertion (SSAI) technology in the world today. Its solution allows live streams and on demand (VoD) content to be monetized for OTT in a way that is true to the seamless viewer experience of linear television, while opening up benefits of digital advertising such as one-to-one addressability and real-time measurement.

Yospace was the first to publicly demonstrate SSAI in a live stream, with ITV in 2012, and today services major broadcasters and network operators across the globe, including DIRECTV and FOX in the USA; Sky Media, ITV, BT Sport, Channel 4 and STV in the UK; Telia and TV4 in Sweden; Optus, Nine, and Seven West Media in Australia.

In early 2019 Yospace was 100% acquired by RTL Group.

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