Video Quality of Experience

And as video's migration online upends traditional means of doing business, it also presents an opportunity to innovative new providers.

"Pay-TV operators are simultaneously grappling with how to address the desire among subscribers to take their content with them wherever they go, whenever they go," adds Heynen. "The net result is a major change in what equipment pay TV operators invest in to ingest, encode, transcode, and play out video content, as well as how they negotiate with content owners for the right to distribute content across multiple formats."

But what operators must understand is the specific manner in which video is being consumed online, according to Cam Cullen, VP of Global Marketing, Procera Networks.

“First operators need to understand the video QoE that subscribers are receiving, not just in aggregate, but by device, location, content provider, and even by resolution,” Cullen says. “It may be that all subscribers are having a degraded experience during certain times of the day or in specific locations, but it also could be that only a few high value subscribers are having issues--which would be the worst case scenario for the operator. Once the operator has an understanding of how their subscribers are consuming video content, they can then explore the different methods to improve video QoE, which could include prioritization, targeted service packages, additional bandwidth in the access, direct peering or increased peering bandwidth, managed peering, video optimization or targeted video optimization, or even intelligent congestion management that took into account service plans, applications, devices, location and content.”

With old models withering, new solutions are required to manage and monitor the online quality and experience of video, often driving collaborations within the space. Procera Networks and Avvasi announced in November 2013, a collaboration to provide mobile operators with a marriage of video QoE management and analytics capabilities.

“Measurement of mobile video quality is directly aligned with our analytics strategy, so partnering with the leading video-quality analytics company was the most logical step to take,” said James Brear, president and CEO of Procera Networks. “Our customers will gain tremendous insight from combining Avvasi’s Q-VUE with our Internet Intelligence data to develop a better understanding of how they can build successful video monetization strategies.”

The companies add that the business of online video is still on the march, with video traffic today accounting for more than 50 percent of all mobile traffic and predicted to reach 70 percent in just a few years.

“Video quality of experience measurement is a very specialized field that is ideally suited to complement Procera Networks’ world-class Intelligent Policy Enforcement capabilities,” said Mate Prgin, president and CEO of Avvasi. “Avvasi’s Q-VUE is the market-leading product in QoE measurement. We are excited to provide our unique technology and skill set to Procera’s customers.”