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Published on 26 Apr 2018
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With around 1,700 exhibitors and 95,000 attendees, the Las Vegas convention center was certainly crowded. But in a good way — with tons of expert speakers, professional network events, inspirational talks, enriching debates, and lots of valuable meetings for Globecast.             
Here’s a recap of the hot trends at NAB Show 2018.

5G, faster and stronger

5G is seen as a “key enabler” for new markets. On Saturday April 7th Dr. Athul Prasad, senior specialist at Nokia Bell Labs, discussed 5G and its “ability to support the delivery of new media content.”
With one millisecond latency, increased capacity and reliability, and broadcast-quality content over mobile, for many 5G is the next big thing. It is expected to be ten times faster than the current 4G network in terms of moving data. And now it’s coming with the first 5G smartphones to be launched next year.

4K, UHD, HDR and more – the future of video

A panel of speakers discussed the future and challenges of video. 4K, UHD, HDR or HFR? Matthew Goldman, Senior Vice President Technology at Ericsson explained that if we had the choice between all these next-generation viewing technologies, we would like to have them all.
But all speakers agreed that there was a constant search for a high degree of realism. Moving to higher resolutions, High Dynamic Range (HDR) provides broadcasters with higher contrast, brighter colours or shadow details, for instance.
At the show, we also noticed more 4K UHD offerings. Many of the TV sets shipped to Western Europe, North America, and China are now 4K. It allows viewers to see details they wouldn’t normally see with standard HD.
So walking through the hallways of the show we saw many cameras and post-production systems featuring 4K UHD.

AI: Accuracy continues to improve as the data comes in

We’ve heard a lot about Artificial Intelligence. Even if there’s still a trust issue going on, people are showing growing interest in AI technology and its potential applications. Amongst them is the use of AI in the content creation and production area. As mentioned by several speakers during the IBC webinar NAB Show 2018 Deconstructed, AI allows wider progress regarding voice, image and language recognition. Identifying emotions and sentiments, scripts or versioning; all this and more will be a lot easier.

There was a session “Video AI: what’s in my content?” available here on Live from NAB show starting at 5:28:13. At the end, speakers were thinking about exciting applications for AI such as logo detection, topic detection, or live. Real-time applications, and real-time algorithms to be able to analyze a live show, automatically translate subtitles while people are talking, or show references to similar shows while people are watching, are areas that show exciting opportunities.
So the next step with AI technology is ‘actual meaning’. More than being able to detect humans or objects, there’s an intent to apply AI to make content even smarter and customizable, and this is developing fast.

Finally, another interesting point that was discussed is the way AI could bring resourceful and monetizable insight to advertisers. At a certain point we will be able to understand when viewership goes up or down, what made people turn away; whether it was something said or because of the tone in which it was said. The aim is to bring much more relevance between the actual ads and what people desire to watch.

More investment in the cloud

Regarding content hosting, management and delivery, there’s a growing interest and demand for cloud-based solutions. According to Goldstein Research, cloud computing market in North America will reach $131.8 billion by 2024.

At this year’s NAB, Globecast launched its new, flexible cloud playout services as well as a pop-up offering for short-duration events. Customers want and need more OPEX models, and the flexibility to rapidly launch new services. With our cloud channel playout, we help them reach new international markets by managing their content and schedules and allowing them to quickly add or remove channels without traditional financial limitations.

We also understand the increasing concern regarding cyber-crime, which is a great threat to every company. Cyber-crime damage is predicted to hit $6 trillion by 2021, while global spending on cybersecurity is expected to exceed $1 trillion from 2017 to 2021.
Therefore our cloud playout offers business continuity and disaster recovery solutions.

Empowering women in tech

Amy DeLouise tweet for GalsNGear NAB

On Tuesday, #GalsNGear hosted a live-streamed event with a panel discussion about gender in broadcast. The hashtag rapidly reached 4.7 million impressions in one hour on Twitter, compared to two millions over two days last year. This was the third edition of the event at NAB featuring female industry leaders — amongst them CEOs, filmmakers, product managers, designers and producers.

You can watch the recorded live of #GalsNGear here: https://www.nabshow.com/video/nab-show-live-tuesday-0

eSports on the rise

eSports was also a trending theme at this NAB, with a brand new conference “eSports: Get in on the Action”, produced in partnership with the eSports Ad Bureau.
There were six sessions on how to understand the audience and device habits, create engaging content or sponsorship options and success stories.
With 165 million permanent viewers and around 215 million occasional viewers, the eSports market offers plenty of opportunities for both traditional broadcasters and OTT services. And it’s also a good way for broadcasters to reach and attract millennial audiences, who represent more than half of total eSports viewership.

Last words from the Globecasters!

For NAB 2018 we focused on three themes: accuracy, flexibility, and security in broadcast, and how to offer cost-efficient solutions to answer the needs of our customers and the wants of their clients.  Therefore we had a great time discussing cloud playout, GCXN, Globecast liveSpotter, CAAD, and our business continuity and disaster recovery solutions.

In the end, it’s always a pleasure to meet with our partners and customers and to engage with others in our industry.  Thanks for visiting our booth this year! We hope to continue to surprise you with innovation and flexible, secure, and accurate solutions.