NAB 2022 – A great return to form

By Eddie Ferraro, Managing Director, Globecast Americas

Zoom, Teams, Webex…the list goes on and it’s a list of applications even the technology adverse have become used to using over the past two years and more. While they are incredibly useful and have helped keep both professional and personal worlds connected, it simply isn’t the same as face-to-face.

Yes, I know this may sound obvious, but at NAB 2022 this point was abundantly clear. I think it took some by surprise just how good it was to be properly networking again, seeing familiar faces and those new to us.

The numbers aren’t the story

The raw numbers – this year’s NAB Show saw a preliminary registered attendance of 52,468, down from the 91,500 registered attendees in 2019, while international numbers also fell with 11,542 attendees, approximately 22 per cent of this year’s numbers compared to 26 per cent in 2019 – really don’t tell the whole story. In short, this was a very, very good show. The people who attended really wanted to be there; they had a purpose and that was fantastic to see and be part of. As my colleague, Neil Butterfield, Director of Sales, Latin America at Globecast, said after the show, “NAB 2022 was especially important this year. Meeting our customers with my colleagues from the UK and Paris, interacting with our CEO and Chairman Philippe Bernard and other key team members, and seeing how the media landscape has progressed in the past two-and-a-half years was incredible.”

He added, “The enthusiasm among our partners in this ecosystem is at an all-time high. Content creators, our media supply chain streaming partners and customers are all enthusiastic to be meeting in-person again and rolling up their sleeves to go after new revenue. Our cloud playout offering is receiving a lot of attention as reflected in the plethora of partner/vendor meetings that were held during the show.”

To find out more about our cloud playout strategy and services, there’s a great article here by our US CTO Chris Pulis. And to find out in more detail, he’s also recently written an interesting blog looking at our work with Crown Media and GAC Media. You can also watch his CMIP presentation here.

AWS Partnership

As that blog explains, our recent AWS partnership announcement, and our work with them over recent years on multiple projects, is central to our market-leading cloud playout and media supply chain services. It was great to sit down with them and continue the momentum that we’ve built. As my colleague Sebastien Fauzan, Head of Marketing for Live and Sports at Globecast, said when we broke the news, “We’re very pleased to achieve AWS Partner status. We have worked with AWS across our media supply chain services, including major cloud playout projects. Globecast MCN (Managed Cloud Network) is the first service of ours to complete the FTR (Foundation Technical Review). AWS comprehensively evaluated the services we can provide with MCN, closely examining the design, build and the way it’s operated.”

Sustainability and Diversification

Philippe Bernard took part in a very interesting IABM panel session, involving four CEOs, looking at sustainability and diversification as well as how AI and machine learning is changing businesses.

And not be outdone, Tim Jackson, our SVP of Sales and Marketing, Americas, took part in a one-on-one video interview where he expands upon the subject of cloud playout and how it relates to our recently reinvigorated strategy, more details of which you will hear about soon.

The technologies Globecast invests in, from Net Insight to TAG, Inetsat to Synamedia, to name a few, have all continued along powerful development paths and that was great to see at NAB 2022.

Of course, not everything was about the cloud and wider media supply chain initiatives; far from it. As Butterfield explains, “At the show, our two-way IP-over-satellite solution – GCVN – gained particular attention and, as a direct result, after the show we have new projects confirmed, the details of which we’ll share when appropriate.”

As you can see, the number of customer and vendor meetings, and the enthusiasm shown in those meetings by all parties, was great to experience. This was a fantastic show and now we’re really looking forward to IBC.