MultiChoice and Microsoft look to the future of entertainment in Africa

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The world of entertainment is changing rapidly. Increased access to fibre to the home, as well as a growing number of content creators and video-on-demand services are forcing large entertainment companies to rethink their business strategies and innovate new and exciting ways to delight their customers.

The MultiChoice Group and its companies have long provided subscribers across Africa with quality content, but in this new highly competitive and dynamic environment, it is imperative that it adapts its content and the way it delivers the content if it wants to remain one of Africa's most successful entertainment businesses.

As part of its digital transformation journey, the MultiChoice Group partnered with Microsoft South Africa across various solutions including Azure, Microsoft 365, D365 and security services. Key to the relationship is the fact that both organisations share a future view of responsible innovation, as well as technologies and solutions that empower end users.

The partnership is enabling MultiChoice to deal with the challenges of its ever-changing industry by driving efficiencies in the business through collaboration, and to explore innovative ways of delivering content to its subscribers thanks to artificial intelligence and big data analytics.

MultiChoice is streamlining its business, becoming more agile and innovative.

As a crucial partner in MultiChoice's digital transformation journey, Microsoft provides the platform and toolsets that allow it to take its new agile offerings to market quicker, cheaper and better.

Azure as a platform for innovation:

MultiChoice's digital transformation journey with Microsoft started four years ago when the company began exploring the use of Azure as a platform. Initial explorations began with light loads within the business's IT division, looking at the migration of tape libraries into the cloud. Since then, the relationship has grown exponentially, and MultiChoice is now running test and production workloads across the business. Optimising operations where possible and using Azure as an innovation platform.

In 2018 during the FIFA World Cup in Russia, MultiChoice demonstrated the power of cloud technology when it was able to stream the semi-final and final of the tournament to subscribers in 4k on the Azure platform, demonstrating just how quick and easy it is to spin up these types of services in the cloud and to deliver them to MultiChoice's customer base.

MultiChoice has chosen Azure as a key platform on their journey to the cloud, says Alkis Flemetakis, Account Director - Enterprise Commercial at Microsoft Corporation. They are continuously assessing the environment and over the last four years, have created prototypes and MVPs (Minimum Viable Products) on the Microsoft cloud platform. Currently, MultiChoice are looking at migrating significant IT workloads to Azure and using AI and machine learning to develop innovative solutions for their customers.

One such project, which is currently in proof of concept, is the dubbing and subtitling of content for different markets.

Says Brad Eliot: Group Chief Information Officer at MultiChoice: We produce a lot of our own local content and there's a drive to see if we can use speech recognition to dub and subtitle that content. With the volume of media assets, we have literally thousands and thousands of hours of content, so doing this in a non-automated fashion would just be impossible and inefficient .

A second key development, which will be launched next year, is automated highlights packages for sport.

Using Azure, MultiChoice will be able to produce highlights packages in near real-time for use not only in live broadcasts but also on social media platforms, meaning MultiChoice can still deliver live, easy-to-consume content to customers who are on-the-go but still want access to their favourite sporting content.

Another added value service being explored is that of automated content moderation. Using machine learning, MultiChoice is exploring ways to automate the moderation of profanity, nudity and violence - linking to Microsoft's approach to responsible AI and providing customers with the peace of mind that their children will not have access to inappropriate content in the future.

MultiChoice is additionally looking to harness the power of AI and co-create innovation that is locally relevant. Through its partnership with Microsoft, MultiChoice is looking to leverage AI, Mixed Reality and Cognitive Services technologies that are radically changing the audience experience compared to traditional static linear TV.

There is also the potential to use AI to improve accessibility for MultiChoice customers. Microsoft's Seeing AI app, for instance, narrates the world around a person, describing people, texts and objects, while Microsoft Translator provides real-time captions for the deaf or hard of hearing.

Other players in the Media and Entertainment industry are already enjoying success by leveraging these technologies: SkySports is using Mixed Reality for audiences to interact with well-known golfers, obtain vital stats on their games, as well as accessories, and US Football live event producers are using Mixed Reality to bring the real-life experience of the stadium to the home or sports pub. Families, friends can also engage in the experience using immersive technology.

This shows that there are significant opportunities for MultiChoice within AI, Mixed Reality and Cognitive Services.

MultiChoice also recognises that there are opportunities available by leveraging the power of Microsoft's partnerships with leading media partner solutions which run on Azure, contributing to the modernisation of the broadcast value chain with a smooth transition in operations and minimal upskilling of staff as well as

LINK:	https://www.screenafrica.com/2020/03/17/technology/film-tv-video-broad...
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