What’s next for CDNs?
By Pete Wylie

All the predictions I’ve seen lately have broadband access rapidly increasing under an Obama administration. Everyone is also almost universally pronouncing that online video will drive major increases in traffic and bandwidth usage over the next few years.

That’s made me take a close look at the players in the space that will handle the explosion of traffic, enable larger audiences to watch longer live streaming events, and deliver a company’s video assets globally. Of course, I’m talking about content delivery networks.

Currently, Akamai is the leader in the space, followed by Limelight and Level 3. Akamai has generated more than a quarter billion dollars in cash flow since the beginning of the year, and it has nearly $800 million in cash and cash equivalents on hand. However, the company just announced it was cutting 110 jobs, so there are questions as to how the economic downturn is affecting the CDN space.

Limelight, which operates at large losses and lost an expensive patent infringement case to Akamai, has narrowed its negative margins but still looks wounded. At press time, Limelight’s stock was trading at around $2.50, a far cry from its $24 IPO price.

Level 3 is in slightly better position, as its CDN business has been growing and offsetting losses elsewhere in its holdings. It acquired Savvis’s CDN properties in Asia, completely retooled them, and now has a significant, top-class offering in that growing space.

But the Big 3 CDNs are sure to start feeling pressure from upstarts in the space.

James Segil, president of EdgeCast, said his company is the fastest growing CDN in the industry, and that it has added 325 customers since it exited stealth mode about 16 months ago. He noted that EdgeCast had managed to gain a significant foothold in the market due to the fact that it is taller, better looking and more charming than the other major CDNs. Those attributes are a big plus in Los Angeles, where EdgeCast is based, but Segil, this time on a serious note, said the position near Hollywood is a unique opportunity for his company to work with the major studios on their growing content delivery efforts.

Segil said the lack of legacy dead weight allows EdgeCast to offer full CDN services at half the price of other full-service players — he criticized Limelight for the costly buildout of its fiber network. Segil and his original team built the technology behind EdgeCast themselves without outside funding. The company then got a $6 million round of funding from Disney’s Steamboat Ventures shortly after announcing itself to the public in 3Q 2007. Sales are now 75 percent direct and 25 percent indirect, through resellers and companies that bundle EdgeCast’s CDN offering with other telecommunications and bandwidth needs, according to Segil. EdgeCast leases fiber capacity from incumbent telcos, which Segil said is a much more cost-effective way to deliver content, because there is a glut of dark fiber buildout.

He doesn’t think cloud offerings from Amazon and others pose a true threat to top level CDN players, either, because they can’t support the level of traffic and video formats, for instance, that the big CDNs can. While he feels smaller companies will benefit greatly from low-cost, use-as-you-need cloud content delivery offerings, he thinks anyone concerned with low cost, high quality, large-scale delivery will inevitably turn to a major CDN.

Source: http://www.fierceonlinevideo.com/story/whats-next-cdns/2008-11-26

Despite Google having it’s impressive CDN (content delivery network) for streaming live videos, Google is going for third party vendor services to host YouTube Live live concert. But it’s not Adobe’s Flash Media Server nor Wowzat Youtube BackedUp by Akamai…

Yes it’s Akamai, the leader in streaming content delivery. It was first a rumor that Google was partnering with Mogulus, Ustream or Justin.TV. But they chose to work with Akamai. Streaming live events with more than 100,000 simultaneous viewers is a tough ask and Akamai based on it’s past experience and reliable infrastructure is now readily backing up Google services, despite Google paying high costs for it.

It appears based on public Akamai data that about 700,000 people were watching the YouTube concert at its peak.

Source: http://startupmeme.com/youtube-backedup-akamai/

MONTREAL — Nov. 24, 2008 — HaiVision Systems Inc., the world leader in performance video encoding technology, today announced that Rambla has deployed HaiVision’s hai1000 H.264 MAKO-HD encoders/decoders to facilitate real-time high-definition streaming broadcasts over the Rambla Content Delivery Network (CDN). Solution partners included Wowza® Media Systems and its award-winning Wowza Media Server® Pro platform, providing fast, economical, and efficient live Flash® H.264 content delivery, as well as Diginet, Belgium’s lead solution partner for video over IP products.

The first effort was a concert broadcast online over IP to an audience of more than 1,500 people last month. Hosted by the new ABtv service, the transmission showcased crisp live video streams in HD quality of the American band Calexico from the sold-out Ancienne Belgique theatre. The home audience had front-row seats for the concert thanks to HaiVision, Wowza, and the Rambla CDN.

“HaiVision’s systems provide unmatched real-time HD streaming performance,” said Jo Martens of Rambla. “The MAKO allowed us to put live Flash HD streaming to the test. Thanks to the MAKO-HD H.264 codec’s ability to deliver video at the highest-possible resolution and at the lowest-possible latency, we were able to offer a compelling experience to the remote audience. The proof was in all the positive comments from fans.”

“Rambla is a streaming service provider of the highest caliber,” said Dave Stubenvoll, Wowza’s CEO. “Wowza could not imagine a better environment in which to showcase H.264 HD Flash streaming than the MAKO’s industry-leading encoding performance coupled with Wowza Media Server Pro’s industrial strength and Rambla’s rock-solid CDN.”

Source: http://blog.svconline.com/briefingroom/2008/11/24/rambla-turns-to-wowza-and-haivision%E2%80%99s-mako-hd-to-show-the-future-of-high-definition-web-tv/

The CDN (content delivery network) market might not be as downturn-proof as analysts at first thought, following the news that one of its lead players is going slim its workforce in response to the global financial crisis.

Akamai Technologies, plans to cut 7 per cent of its staff says its CFO, JD Sherman, eliminating 110 positions. The company says this will free up cash for continued investment should credit markets dry up further - an aggressive posture considering the company has $800 million cash on hand. “We have not changed our business outlook,” said Sherman. “We want to ensure that we can keep investing for growth even in the current economic climate.”

The move is the first real indication CDN and hosted services operators could be vulnerable to the worldwide downturn. Akamai and its peers generally posted strong 3Q growth, leading analysts to suggest the segment could be immune to broader telecom woes.

Source: http://web20.telecomtv.com/pages/?newsid=44162&id=e9381817-0593-417a-8639-c4c53e2a2a10&view=news

Amazon and Microsoft, two of the leaders in the evolving cloud-services space, are offering customers a number of wares that — at least on the surface — sound similar. But in the area of caching, the paths of the two providers are diverging.

Amazon, aware that Microsoft was poised to finally take the wraps off its cloud strategy/services, launched a preemptive strike against the Softies earlier this fall. The result: Both companies are offering hosted SQL Server-based database services (Amazon’s SimpleDB and Microsoft’s SQL Services); an underlying storage service (Amazon’s S3 and Microsoft’s Azure Storage layer): a “cloud operating system” (Amazon’s EC2 and Microsoft’s Azure OS); the ability to host Windows apps/services on remote datacenter servers.

Source: http://blogs.zdnet.com/microsoft/?p=1738

Revolutionary Multi-Camera Interface Delivers Five Concurrent Video Streams to Diggnation Viewers, Putting Them in Charge for the First Time Ever

SAN FRANCISCO, CA, Nov 21, 2008 (MARKET WIRE via COMTEX) — Forget holograms, the next real video breakthrough is here from Internet video pioneers Revision3 and BitGravity. On November 21st at 6 p.m. EST, Revision3 will unveil a one of a kind episode of its hit show, providing a unique, interactive way for viewers to watch hosts Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht discuss the week’s top stories from Digg.com.

Using breakthrough technology from Internet video network BitGravity, fans will get to choose from five simultaneous and separate video streams, putting them in control of what they watch. Episode #177 — “Your Diggnation Remix” — will be available at http://www.revision3.com/remix.

“Diggnation was the first successful social video program featuring some of the top content voted on by the Digg community,” said Jim Louderback, CEO, Revision3. “Now we’re taking that to the next logical level, letting viewers control camera angles and other elements of the viewing experience. It’s a brand new and revolutionary way to give our viewers even more control, and more ownership, of the programs they love.”

Source: http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/TVs-Interactive-Future-Arrives-Today/story.aspx?guid={D4099CE7-6E72-4407-ACF1-B7AA9180ECD2}

It’s been a while since I’ve done this. Enjoy!

CDN Assist Technology to Support Commercial Content Delivery

BROOMFIELD, Colo., Nov 20, 2008 /PRNewswire-FirstCall via COMTEX/ — Level 3 Communications, Inc. today announced that it has been selected to provide caching and downloading services to Pando Networks, a pioneer of content delivery cloud services. Pando will use Level 3’s content delivery network (CDN) to support the delivery of rich media content for commercial customers.

“Level 3’s CDN technology enables us to expand our content delivery cloud service with greater reliability and quality than standalone P2P technology,” said Robert Levitan, chief executive officer of Pando Networks. “This expansion builds out our technology platform to provide customers with a more powerful and cost effective solution to deliver online content.”

Level 3’s caching and downloading services will enhance Pando’s content delivery cloud platform and enable users to download and stream large media files, including full-screen high-definition (HD) video. These capabilities strengthen Pando’s ability to provide accelerated delivery speeds and maintain the highest quality video, resulting in a better online viewing experience.

“Level 3 is pleased to deliver caching and downloading to support Pando’s content delivery cloud services,” said Grant van Rooyen, president of Level 3’s Content Markets Group. “The emergence of CDN assist technology reinforces the underlying need for the power and performance of our CDN services to support large-scale commercial distribution of online content.”

Under the terms of the agreement, Level 3 will support Pando’s delivery of HD online video for NBC Direct. Currently in beta release, NBC Direct allows users free access to download high-resolution episodes of select NBC shows.

Source: http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/Level-3-Selected-Support-Pando/story.aspx?guid={13F440BD-D7C4-47BA-9160-6D3EE2D9C8AD}

Amazon (AMZN) announced the roll-out of its long-expected content delivery service, calling it “Cloudfront.” One common reaction: The service will disrupt CDN leaders Akamai (AKAM) or Limelight (LLNW). Not immediately.

Amazon.com is jumping into the content delivery network market. Smart move. But it won’t be a significant threat to industry leaders Akamai or Limelight any time soon.

That’s because it’s not supposed to: Amazon is targeting the users of its other cloud services like S3, EC2, etc. In fact, it requires that its CDN clients use its S3 storage system, which pretty much ensures that it won’t steal any of the CDNs’ huge media and enterprise customers any time soon.

And as industry analyst Dan Rayburn — who’s been briefed on Amazon’s plans — notes, Amazon’s service won’t help with “live broadcasting, Flash, Silverlight, transcoding, authentication, and reporting and analytics specific to video” — all features that the big guys offer.

So while Amazon could easily build out these services to compete with Akamai and Limelight down the road, its initial push will be to steal customers away from smaller CDNs like Cachefly, BitGravity, or Panther Express — full disclosure, a company we share investors, a chairman, and office space with.

Source: http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/11/amazon-s-cdn-won-t-hurt-akamai-or-limelight-not-yet-at-least

Verizon Communications’ announcement of a new content delivery network (CDN) for its users gives the carrier a strong path to using peer-to-peer (P2P) technology in CDNs. And because the carrier is using the CDN to serve its own customers, it gives Verizon a level of control unique in the CDN space.

A key reason for Verizon’s selection of the Velocix platform as the basis of its new CDN is the vendor’s native support of P2P technology, Verizon said, though the carrier is not yet using the platform’s P2P capabilities. The first consumer offering that Verizon is announcing as being delivered through the new CDN, the Starz Play on-demand offering, does not currently use P2P, for example.

“It’s not doing P2P for us about of the box,” said Doug Pasko, Verizon’s senior technologist. “Our intention is to support the ability to do [P2P]. If someone out there is looking to do a hybrid P2P solution, we don’t want to turn them away.”

However, Verizon has repeatedly talked about the potential for P2P in content delivery, even mulling the notion of harnessing customer premises devices such as set-top boxes as P2P nodes. And Pasko himself co-chairs the P4P Working Group, which focuses on developing new P2P architectures for more efficient content delivery. UK-based Velocix is something of a P2P specialist in the CDN space.

Source: http://telephonyonline.com/iptv/news/verizon-cdn-p2p-1119/