Cisco is a leader in IP NGN technology and works closely with service
providers to address their specific needs as per different markets. Cisco
recently launched a Videoscape solution that lets consumers bring together
content from pay TV, online, and on-demand sources. They can then combine
content with social media, communications, and mobility to create a truly
immersive TV experience. Vish Iyer,
vice president – Service Provider , Cisco India & SAARC, talks about video
market opportunities in India
What is driving the demand in Cisco’s video
services lately?
The advent of new technologies like 3G and
the changing consumer preferences has lead to increased demand for Video on the
internet. According to the Cisco Visual Index study, video will account for
nearly 90 percent of all consumer Internet traffic by 2013, and 60 percent of
all online video will be consumer video. In India, Internet video traffic will
be 63 percent of all consumer Internet traffic in 2015, up from 20 percent in
2010. Internet-Video-to-TV traffic will increase 85-fold between 2010 and 2015.
These new trends in the consumer segment have led to increased demand for Cisco
video services. Cisco works closely with service providers and helps them
transition to experience providers by upgrading their network infrastructure to
deliver a superior video experience.
Cisco predicts that the number of
network-connected devices will be more than 15 billion, twice the world’s
population, by 2015. In the fifth annual Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI)
Forecast (2010-2015), the company also said the total amount of global Internet
traffic will quadruple by 2015.
The launch of 4G-LTE in the coming months
will escalate delivery of video services in many spheres like e-governance,
e-healthcare and e-education apart from VAS. According to a report from comScore,
online video viewing in India experienced a sharp increase in February and
March this year thanks to the Cricket World Cup.
Are you happy with the existing Indian market
scenario? What is the market opportunity?
Yes we are very happy with the current market
scenario in India. Cisco sees a lot of potential in the Indian market. With the
advent of 3G in India, we are already seeing an upsurge in data/video services;
which has led the service providers to upgrade their network infrastructure to
meet this growing demand. The introduction of 4G in India will further lead to
an increased demand for data/video services and the need to migrate to an all
IP infrastructure.
Cisco is a leader in IP NGN technology and
enables Service providers to migrate to this architecture to meet the growing
demand for data services as well as to enable service providers to drive new
revenue streams.
Since video services will generate massive
upsurge in mobile data traffic, are there any challenges in tackling the data
traffic?
Transfer and delivery of video is complex
with many networks, formats and standards working together to produce high
quality visual data. Delivering new video experiences place additional demands
on networks in terms of performance, adaptability, and manageability. To
deliver an immersive video experience, greater collaboration will be required
between service providers, content providers and network infrastructure
providers. Networks of the future will need to support many rich media types
along with traditional voice and data services.
Focusing on Cisco’s role in cable
digitization, what is Cisco’s upcoming video strategy in the enterprise as well
as consumer space?
Consumers today want personal, social, and
interactive experiences, with content delivered anytime, anywhere, on any
device. The resulting bandwidth explosion is straining the network
infrastructure, however. Intelligent networks, or medianets, as Cisco call it,
provide the massive scaling, capital and operational cost optimization, and
transformed consumer experience that cable operators need.
Do you think, it’s time for consolidation as
maintaining ecosystem is prerequisite in terms to cater high video demands?
What is the market growth?
As discussed above, transfer and delivery of
video is complex with many networks, formats and standards working together to
produce high quality visual data. Hence maintaining an ecosystem will
definitely be important. Ecosystem players will need to work together to deliver
immersive video experiences.
By Rashi Varshney
[email protected]
