How the broadcast industry will look in 2021

How the broadcast industry will look in 2021

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Andy Rayner February 12, 2021

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How the broadcast industry will look in 2021

Predicting the shape of the broadcasting industry in 2021 would be almost impossible without taking the 2020 into account. The Covid-19 pandemic had a seismic impact on the industry, causing it to change faster than at any point in the past century. With five years of evolution having been compacted into 12 months, broadcasters, service providers and vendors are now rethinking their priorities and business plans for the rest of 2021.

Investment in new technologies

Live production was made much more difficult due to social distancing measures brought in place as a result of to the pandemic, and many live sports events cancelled or played behind closed doors. In turn, this resulted in some broadcasters going into survival mode, both financially and in terms of making broadcasting work in the new environment. Consequently, practically all planned production infrastructure investments were put on hold.

The requirement for investment remains however and subject to an improvement in the pandemic situation, 2021 could see a surge in new projects, especially around the move to IP.

Vendors will be changing the way they deliver projects

It wasn't the case however that all broadcasting projects were cancelled in 2020. Many broadcasters had commitments, which they could not circumvent, such as moving premises. Others saw the pandemic as an opportunity to embark on transformational projects at a time when they would cause minimum disruption to live production due to the influx of cancellations.

Vendors have had to find ways of delivering projects on time in the face of travel restrictions, and technologies such as virtual meetings and remote training, configuration and testing have played a crucial role. Many were still able to deliver significant projects during 2020, aided by the fact that their key products were largely software based and therefore able to be managed remotely. Even in the event of travel routes being opened up in 2021, this some of these remote approaches to project deliveries are likely to continue this year given the positive impact it has had on project effectiveness and efficiency.

The industry will look to improve from-home production

Contributors and production teams faced the unprecedented situation of creating shows from home in 2020 due to the pandemic. The use of communications technology such as office tools like Skype and Zoom for ingest and home-broadband network connectivity kept shows on air, but it resulted in a real degradation of production values, a key differentiator for the broadcast industry. In fact, some broadcast content was arguably of lower production quality than that of many professional vloggers.

From-home production, different from at home production (i.e. traditional remote production), will be a crucial component of a broadcaster's toolkit even when the situation improves, but they will be looking to the industry this year to start improving its production values. This is a multifaceted task that will involve exploring the use of alternative broadband connectivity (including potentially 5G) and orchestration across locations including homes.

Uptake in cloud and 5G

Cloud technology has been steadily shifting from distribution to playout and increasingly into the MCR in 2021, and the next step will be using cloud in live production. Small scale productions are already possible in the cloud. For example, Sony offers virtual production solutions using up to six camera sources, professional quality switching and reliable streaming. Initiatives like the VSF's Ground-Cloud-Cloud-Ground (GCCG) and AWS's Cloud Digital Interface (CDI) are laying the groundwork for larger productions with a multi-vendor soft-eco-system.

While 5G's full potential in broadcasting is yet to be realised, it is generating a lot of excitement in the industry. The real game-changer for live broadcast production will be when service providers offer QoS through guaranteed bandwidth, which may not happen in 2021.

A move towards industry consolidation

Over the last few years, the need for solutions with broad footprints has accelerated the process of consolidation among vendors. The Covid-19 pandemic has further strengthened the case for consolidation due to the impact that it has had on vendors' finances, across both small and large organisations. It's therefore likely that further changes in the vendor landscape will take place in 2021.

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