GigaOM Radar Edge Platform Leader & Outperformer 2024 | 
Edgio’s new strategic partnership with Emmy Award-winning multimedia technology powerhouse, Bitmovin, promises greater flexibility, lower cost and more scale protection than ever before for our customers. The impact of this partnership on content delivery is endless.
Together, we will now be able to directly address the growing delivery challenge with real-time analytics shaping decision-making.
With Bitmovin Playback, Edgio, as the Managed Service Provider, will be able to deliver the highest quality experience to many different devices using its Video Content Delivery Network (CDN) that has made great strides in recent years to land among the best in the industry.
The seamless collaboration brings Bitmovin’s advanced player analytics plus Uplynk’s integrated streaming platform together to provide worry-free scaling, stable Server-Side Ad Insertion (SSAI), and seamless low-latency performance.
CDNs are essentially data centers that work together to facilitate the connection, so that content like images, videos, scripts, and stylesheets can be expediently delivered to users. Edgio’s Video CDN is special because its many connections ensure that the stream’s source or origin server is not overwhelmed with requests, enabling the team to deliver content more efficiently to a wider range of people, no matter the location.
But effective CDNs are critical to the success of any business. Delays caused by buffering and unstable connections happen often for people without a strong CDN nearby to tap into. It may seem like just a few seconds, but that buffering or latency can significantly impact revenue. In fact, it has been estimated that the average cost of downtime for a business can be as much as $5,600 per minute! We all know that faster load times lead to better user experience, lower bounce rates, enhanced SEO, resilience against cyber threats, and increased user experience—which of course leads to more revenue for a business and more time for overall strategy.
The CDN market is a competitive one, which leads to a variety of pricing plans that consider things like the chosen provider, feature set, data volume, geographic coverage, and additional services. Although the establishment and maintenance of Points of Presence can incur notable expenses, these strategic nodes are indispensable for CDN providers, ensuring swift and reliable content delivery on a global scale.
How Does it Work?
We now know the benefits, but knowing exactly how the synergy works helps to understand why it is so vital.
First, source content feeds into Uplynk, generating a manifest accessed upon a playlist request. Then, Uplynk sends a stream playlist, including segment URLs, to the Bitmovin Player. Simultaneously, video segments are sent to CDNs A and B and passed along to the Bitmovin Player, which then sends segment requests to the CDNs for instant video playback.
Dialing down even further, Bitmovin Analytics sends QoS data and analytics on CDN performance to the CDN decisioning service. In real-time, the CDN decisioning service connects with the manifest service, CDNs A/B, and the QoS data, using the information for live decision-making on the best CDN option. Leveraging Quality of Service (QoS) metrics, the approach focuses on optimizing the individual viewer experience. Video players diligently collect essential QoS metrics, while CDNs play a vital role in using data exchanged through the Common Media Client Data (CMCD) framework. This comprehensive dataset, rich in QoS information, empowers the CDN decisioning service to make informed decisions.
The result of this dynamic decision-making is the highest video quality on any screen through Bitmovin’s modular player, which features low latency, configurable ABR, built-in analytics and Stream Lab—the world’s first stream QoE testing service.
Their Reputations Precede Themselves
Like Edgio, Bitmovin has an impressive track record. A proven forerunner in innovation and development, Bitmovin built the world’s first commercial adaptive streaming player and deploying the first software-defined encoding service that runs on any cloud platform. Its cloud-native technology offers the most flexible and scalable media encoding, playback, and analytics solutions available, with unparalleled device reach, ease of integration, and world-class customer support.
The alliance is a natural fit. We’re both forward-thinking, innovative companies committed to providing solutions and enhancing the services we provide without sacrificing efficiency or value. Edgio is always looking around the corner for the next best opportunity to grow and then share what we glean from that growth with our customers. The best is when we exceed our customers’ expectations!
