144 F E ATUR E and align it by time stamps, so that you have a very accurate snapshot of what's going on with the content as it's delivered,” says Beach. “That's exactly the kind of solution that network operations and media operations teams need." Beach also points to a collaboration with Cinnafilm, a company which provides video and image processing solutions for the media and communications industry, as an important development in Microsoft’s involvement in the field. “We’re working with Cinnafilm to bring world class image processing functionality to Azure,” he says. “Cinnafilm takes video and turns it from 50 frames per second to 60 frames per second, for example, or provides upscaling to 4K that keeps the video incredibly crisp. It’s solutions like Cinnafilm’s that will help us keep the quality of content high as we move production directly into the cloud, so the company is a very important, critical player in the market.” Azure has already powered some of the biggest media events in the world, with Microsoft working in partnership with the NBA to develop new ways of producing and delivering content. Microsoft and the NBA are innovating the sports fan experience with the launch of a new over-the-top (OTT) platform to deliver a personalised, localised offering of content in international markets. “We’ve worked very closely with the NBA over the past two years,” says Beach. “The platform will be transformational, because it will give the league the tools to take their content out to international audiences. But that’s just the beginning of the relationship. We’re continually collaborating on bringing the next big ideas around how sports fans interact with their content to life.” Beach sees live content such as the Olympics and the NBA as one of Microsoft’s major focuses for future development, standing alongside its data offering. “Live content is starting to move into the cloud in a major way,” he says. “We are spending a lot of time focusing on the tooling around live productions in remote and hybrid scenarios. But we’re also focusing on helping connect all the various data estates our media partners have within their pipelines and operationalising their production in a more effective way, helping them to repurpose the content they already have. Those are the two big areas that I always come back to as vital for us being successful in this space.” “ Those who are able to scale rapidly and cost-effectively while still producing compelling content are going to win” JEAN-PAUL BONJOUR, NETFLIX
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