SVG Sit-Down: Telstras Amanda Leighton on Dynamic Connect and the Future of Managed Services

Telstra Broadcast Services may call Australia home but this year it continued to show its strength not only on its home turf but around the globe as it played a major part in the transmission needs for broadcasters at some of the world's biggest and most important sports events. SVG's Co-Executive Director Ken Kerschbaumer recently had a chance to catch up with Amanda Leighton, TBS's chief revenue officer, and learn more about Telstra Dynamic Connect, how Telstra's role with their clients is changing, and much more.

What are some key themes for Telstra this fall?

One of the key things we're trying to do at TBS is show up in the market a little differently. A lot of people know us for contribution and distribution, but they miss the secret sauce in the middle, where we provide a lot of value. We opened the show with a relaunch of our messaging, which centers on how we help media organizations connect, manage, and deliver content anywhere in the world. It covers our intelligent media networks, our managed services, and our deep industry knowledge. We're trying to simplify things for the industry and help customers navigate this period of change.

We're also highlighting Telstra Dynamic Connect (TDC), which we introduced at SVG Australia in Melbourne. TDC lets you use 5G slicing, cellular, fiber, and LEO all in one box. What makes it unique is the dynamic load balancing: depending on which connectivity is available and how it's performing, you can rebalance the load on the fly to keep quality assured for your service.

We launched it in Australia, where we're the local telco, and internationally we're looking for partners to help with the connectivity portion in certain areas. We recently used it for the Sydney Marathon, and TDC was the primary way people around the world viewed the event, which was fascinating. We used 5G slicing, fiber, and more, and it worked great.

Where does TDC sit in relation to the production truck? Does it bring signals in, or distribute them out?

Amanda Leighton, Telstra Broadcast Services, chief revenue officer, at IBC 2026.It's for distributing out. TDC can also be used inside a venue to create the network you need, which gives it real flexibility. Version One is a fixed unit that gets mounted in a specific location, like a venue. The next version will be portable, so you could put one of these boxes in the back of every OB truck or flyaway kit. Wherever you take it, whatever connectivity you have, you have the right box. You simply pay as you go for the services you need, and we add an SLA on top to give you that assurance.

This was a year of major global events. What did you learn from them, and what do they mean for monetization opportunities?

I don't think many people realize how global we are. We're involved in basically all of the big events in some way and it really shows our strength. In markets like the US, people sometimes still see us as an Australian telco, but we've demonstrated the skills, expertise, and strength to deliver major events all over the world. We've showcased the talent on our teams and our ability to understand challenges, think differently, and deliver reliably. That's why clients keep coming back: when we say we're going to deliver something, we deliver.

The walls have really come down in transmission services. You still compete for contracts, but do you sometimes work together on last-mile connectivity?

We have to. For this industry to succeed through all the changes, we need to work together in one way or another. There's still competition, but there are times we need to rely on each other. We might provide a third path of redundancy in a country where we don't have as much infrastructure as we do elsewhere. With partnerships across regions, we may rely on a partner as a third-party provider, and when they come into our territory, we reciprocate where they lack coverage. It's an interesting dynamic.

We're all going after the same things, which can lead to services becoming quite commoditized. We're trying to avoid that, which is why we focus on what we can do in the center: not just contribution and distribution, but how we manage those services to add value to the content.

Is that where managed services come in? Otherwise, clients have to strike another deal, and a one-year circuit deal for a two-week event doesn't make sense.

Exactly. With all the changes in connectivity requirements and international distribution formats, companies face a lot of complexity, and coming through an organization like TBS, we can take that away. You can say, I need this signal sent to this country in this format, and we handle it. It keeps the process hands-off, so clients don't have to negotiate multiple contracts, manage different SLAs, or juggle multiple points of contact. We bring it all down to one simple workflow.

The industry used to have even years and odd years, with the Olympics, World Cup, and elections driving the even years. Has that dynamic gone away?

It has. We've seen a significant change in the sports and events schedule because of the drive for live sports content. It's not only tier-one events anymore; tier-two and tier-three events are getting far more exposure, which evens things out. A significant portion of our business is in live events, and the changing schedule makes revenue less lumpy.

There are also services beyond connectivity. In the off-season, we help clients build their following ahead of an event, and we help with monetizing and distributing archive assets and building OTT platforms. All of that stabilizes the business, so we're not taking a hit in the off years.'

LINK:	https://www.sportsvideo.org/2026/11/03/svg-sit-down-telstras-amanda-le...
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