Playout intelligence is a holistic and integrated approach to creating winning margins in rich content playout: Holistic, as it is a true end-to-end view beyond simple delivery and network connectivity, and Integrated, as it addresses both fixed and mobile service offerings, billing, and digital rights management (DRM), as well as combined business models and integration into next-generation transport platforms; rich content, with the vision of true "single-play," a combined playout of voice, data, video, and business-to-business (B2B) information. It is part of the life-cycle approach of developing, deploying, and maintaining new services for our customers. This is a key aspect of product innovation that will allow our customers to differentiate themselves in the competitive telecommunications market.

Jointly with a customer, a large Internet service provider, radio frequency identification (RFID) and near field communication (NFC) were identified as a strategic focus field for future growth. The client was specifically concerned about the impact these technologies might have on retail and consumers, and how they might be able to leverage these emerging technologies to increase visibility and brand awareness to their customers.

The start was to map out the client-specific ecosystem with regards to markets, technologies, and services. Within this ecosystem, it was then possible to match different scenarios from near-term implementations to strategic investments. More than 40 creative scenarios built on existing stealth mode companies, start-ups, and incumbents were created. The prototyping funnel system provided the business sanity check (see Figure 1).

With a clearer understanding of the possibilities, it was time to bring fire to the process—a tangible prototype and design studies that demonstrate the technology, its impact on clients' business, and experiential evidence of what is possible. A process was also established to constantly share hands-on experience, key findings, and lessons learned so customers could use that know-how for cross-pollination in other business units.

A working prototype, integrated into a live environment, is an opportunity to show off the technology and generate excitement. The demonstration becomes a driver for new initiatives exploring the possible impact of the technology further into the business. Careful work and preparation in creating the prototype often results in additional opportunities in related areas of research and development.

Finally, make sure that the initial excitement is not just a flash in the pan, but also really brings new light to their business. Refine the business model and use cases at a very granular level to facilitate a concrete road map with actionable items, milestones, and critical break points. Constant joint reviews fan the flames started in the earlier steps and give a business case the necessary key performance indicators (KPIs), next steps, and technical recommendations, which will accelerate the decision-making process for product or service introduction.

It is important to understand the concept of combined business modeling, technical due diligence, and prototyping; practice without theory is blind, and theory without practice is empty. As many customers are large firms such as carriers, they should be presented with a proof-of-concept that scales and makes sense for their business. Lately many analysts have been praising the shorter product and feature introduction cycles of Internet-based service providers compared with the slower cycles found at carriers. But Internet-based service providers such as Google or Yahoo depend on advertising revenue streams, whereas carriers depend on service usage and subscription revenue. While Skype earns rave reviews from about 80 million registered users, on an average day only 5 million of these users are logged in. To put this in perspective, in North America alone 120 million cell phones are logged into their home subscriber server, roam freely through three networks, and get an exact billing to the second; 700 million fixed-line phones have a dial tone and E911. In today's turbulent age, one of the few dependable advantages is a superior capacity for reinventing the business model before circumstances force clients to change. This gives clients an opportunity to continuously anticipate and adjust to trends that can permanently impact the earning power of their core business. This means sharing the insight to change before the case for change becomes desperately obvious, i.e., through a competitive advantage ahead of their competition.

Far-reaching vision and ability to communicate and share that vision with customers will enable them to strategically develop their future service portfolio in a way that results in success for them.

With such an ambitious approach, touching many business areas, we quickly realized that innovation has to be seen as part of a transformational change management program. Innovation has to take place from the bottom up and the top down. To make sure that everyone is working together toward the common goals, we have to encourage and support communication across traditional boundaries of divisions and political interests. This communication has to take place on a cultural as well as on a technological level. Carriers must look at the end-to-end view beyond simple delivery and network connectivity; integrated, as it addresses fixed- and mobile-service offerings, billing and DRM, and combined business models and integration into next-generation transport platforms.

Playout intelligence is the vision of truly combining playout of voice, data, video, and B2B information. Truly combined means not just offering multiple services under a single brand or on a single bill, but also merging them into a seamless, holistic, and integrated offer—a single play. It is part of a life-cycle approach of developing, deploying, and maintaining new services for customers. The holistic approach of playout intelligence is not just about content or devices, but also understanding how devices respond, what form the content will have, what applications will be available to support the devices and content, what underlying systems will support the entire environment, and who will consume the service.

Figure 1
Complementary prototyping funnel system. Not only are ecosystems about numbers, but they also form opinions of industry players, experts, and analysts. Both hard and soft factors will influence decision makers, markets, and business cases. They are used to create specialized market models for forecasts as well as KPIs for sanity checks. (Source: Detecon)

Content adaptation is one facet of mobile digital lifestyle. In a fast-moving game such as basketball or soccer, it is important to consider the types of display devices the audience may be using to view the game. If the device is a mobile handset, the playout intelligence framework uses a preprocessing and encoding technique that blurs the background and shows the main game. Distracting fine information such as audience members' faces in the background blend out, and nothing distracts from the actual game play—despite the small viewing screen. Metadata can also be used to show the same content from different angles, depending on the available device.

News shows typically have some text on the screen—such as stock quotes, game results, or weather data—a talking head, and a side image giving a visual context. On a small screen, these details cannot be deciphered. It is necessary to enlarge the talking head, the side image, and text, each with different scaling. Playout intelligence makes it easy to view content on a small screen initially intended for a larger TV screen. The same content is now available on a handheld device and it is more than just visible—it is readable. Specifically generated content, which would be very expensive, can be avoided.

Such an approach becomes even more crucial if service providers want to tap into the newly discovered opportunity of user-generated content. While Weblogs and wikis are well established, the new stars are current.tv, myspace.com, and youtube.com. Carrier business is about mass-market reach and cost-efficient delivery. While everyone is talking about quadruple play, re-encoding, repurposing, or even choosing selective programming for different consumer screens can become a nightmare if the right visual format is unavailable.

In the end, content is king. And niche content is also premium content. Availability of niche content, mass content, customer-centric content, or whatever form it takes will drive consumers to new services. The latest and greatest content, not necessarily the mass content, will bring the customer to the door. This content must be able to be deployed in any environment, on any device, and at a consistent level of experience expected by the user.

Quality of experience (QoE) for the consumer will take on a new role and meaning. QoE is not a metric, but a concept comprising all the elements of subscribers' perception of the network, its performance, and how it meets consumers' expectations in all their environments.

Figure 2 shows the holistic playout intelligence framework for UbiquitousTV, starting with the reception of rich media by content aggregators, ending with display and consumption of the service. Several factors interact to determine QoE, including cost, reliability, availability, usability, utility, and fidelity. QoE is affected by each building block in the content playout. Perception-based and traditional measurements taken after each processing step can propagate backward and forward, tweaking building-block-specific parameters throughout the content playout. A profound correlation of all parameters with changes in perception and experience is key. The orange box shows the maximum possible QoE gain when measuring three building blocks in the transmission area, as Windows Media Server or Real Server do. The blue box shows the maximum possible gain when applying playout intelligence framework to UbiquitousTV.

In our example, a measurement is taken after the encoding process. The measurement propagates a warning that the bit rate will exceed a set limit and the contrast is low. The following results:

• The content management system will try to find a better source to weave into the existing layered codec.
• The network transmission control plane will try to allocate more bandwidth.
• The post processing will know that its processing queue will be filled up soon and the contrast adjustment cannot be done in its software in real time.
• The display will take over the task for contrast adjustment.

Figure 2
Playout intelligence framework for UbiquitousTV. Perception-based measurements taken after each processing step can propagate backward and forward, tweaking building-block-specific parameters throughout the content playout. Correlation of parameters with changes in perception and experience is key. (Source: Detecon)

Carriers that provide superior QoE will enjoy a significant competitive advantage and avoid unnecessary costs, lost revenue, and diminished market perception, as opposed to those that ignore the importance of QoE. Of course, quality will need to be valued throughout all lines of business and not just experienced in one division or department. Word of mouth (viral marketing) among customers about the QoE, especially if it is poor, will result in high churn rates. Excellent QoE may not move as quickly through the market, but it will increase retention rates and reduce subscriber acquisition costs.

Brand strategy will play an important role in extending the geographical footprint of carriers, especially in the mobile market. Strong brand identity will also expand into other services offered by the carrier. For example, the mobile identity of the carrier should be tightly coupled with other aspects of the carrier's services to generate interest in additional bundled services. Even in markets where a carrier has expanded by purchasing an existing provider and has chosen to keep the local brand, the message needs to tie back to their existing strategy. A recognizable international branding strategy will play into the convergence of services for carriers and give them visibility in new service areas.

In the age of fixed-mobile convergence, a similar approach should be taken to address rich service playout in IMS-enabled networks, where extremely fast service creation times and an ever-changing service portfolio make QoE a key for brand recognition and sustainable revenue streams from advertisers and subscribers.

Of course, innovation cannot be a one-size-fits-all turnkey solution, since each service provider's architecture, market needs, and customers are different. Development costs, coupled with tight margins and profit pressures, make it difficult for clients to justify new investment in seemingly unproven technologies—even when the client knows that not making the investment could be even worse. The pressures from stakeholders, both internal and external, to maintain profits and short-term revenue goals can douse the fire of innovation. Chief financial officers more readily grasp the usability or value-add potential of abstract and complicated technologies and solution puzzles, as well as their strategic potential. Mid-level managers understand the business impact on their day-to-day operations as well as on their short-term revenue goals.