While many analysts thought the CES Internet TV battle would be a strictly Apple/Google affair, dark horse Cisco crashed the party early with CEO John Chambers announcing the firm’s new VideoScape offering.
Videoscape, which purports to mesh tv content from broadcast, cable and Internet companies, is aimed at offering service providers a way to offer customers a multitude of media, including social networking, on any of their electronic devices.
“Tying this together is really key,” Chambers noted in his CES keynote last week, adding that he believed Videoscape would “reinvent the entire TV experience.”
Of course, there are already a multitude of Internet TV services available, but Cisco believes its offering will simplify rather than complicate the situation.
We asked Cisco how it thought Videoscape would change the way people consumed content, and just how mobile the product really was.
A Cisco spokeswoman told us that the real game changer was that Cisco offered “the unique capability of leveraging the synergies between technologies and platforms in three areas of video delivery: cloud+network+client.”
While many Cisco competitors could point to cloud, client or a combination of capabilities, she said, only Cisco could add the network as a platform for delivering the experience. This means allowing consumers to take the experience on the go “with the quality, ease of use, and social interactions they increasingly demand.”
In terms of other differentiators between Cisco’s Videoscape and its competitors, Cisco reps seem confident in their product’s quality, content, openness and integration.
“The experience is of a much higher quality since it can take advantage of the network intelligence of the provider,” the spokeswoman told us.
RCR was also told Videoscape had a “much broader range of content” – not just in terms of online video but the full scope of broadcast live and on-demand content, not to mention DVR, high definition and even the major broadcast online sites such as Hulu which aren’t available through competitive TV offerings.
Cisco also deals a low blow to competitor Google, which is constantly bleating on about its openness. While Google may indeed prove rather open compared to Apple TV, Cisco says it in no way wants to restrict people to any kind of device, and will let its product work across all devices, mobile or otherwise.
“Videoscape is able to take advantage of a service provider’s broad range of content and the intelligence of the network itself. Other over-the-top offerings haven’t taken-off well because at best, they offer only a partial experience; or offer a limited subset of content compared to Videoscape; or they provide a PC-like experience on the TV. We don’t believe consumers want to have to reconcile partial solutions but that they prefer a more integrated, immersive experience,” the spokeswoman explained.
When it comes to video, people demand a high-degree of quality, she said, noting that without working with providers, the quality of other offering – like Google TV – could only be called a best-effort at most. Videoscape, meanwhile, “works with the provider vs. against them,” we were told.
“The video market is undergoing a major market transition. Transition in the industry is not optional, and it is not segmented to one company or another. It is universal,” she went on highlighting that video was indeed a key emphasis for Cisco.
“We know that Video will dominate the Internet and one billion video users are projected to be online by 2014. Cisco’s own Visual Networking Index (VNI) forecast tells us that by 2014, the sum of all forms of video (TV, VoD, Internet video, and peer-to-peer) will exceed 91 percent of global consumer traffic. For the first time ever, online Internet video will surpass peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing as the top Internet traffic contributor by the end of this calendar year.”
Cisco’s vision is that all of its products will interoperate, either as an application or as a complementary service, and because it markets directly to service providers using a B2B model, rather than a consumer facing B2C model, it believes it stands a good chance.
A potentially interesting tie in with a Cisco consumer product, however, is with the firm’s Flip camcorder. During Cisco’s CES press conference, CEO John Chambers showed how the Flip could connect to the Videscape Gateway device for immediate upload of videos onto the TV for viewing.
Better yet, he also discussed plans for wireless capabilities in the future with FlipShare synching to the gateway that will make it even easier to upload videos and share on multiple devices.
All in all, Cisco believes Videoscape is providing a compelling proposition for service providers, media companies and consumers alike. And unlike some competitive offerings, Cisco is working with service providers, not against them.
This may prove a smart move as service providers’ scope of service is far more expansive and continues to grow.
“We believe in the value of Cable SPs to offer compelling value in the market,” Cisco’s spokeswoman said. “They are PayTV innovators and together we are building more value into the service package – incorporating all forms of video delivery – online, VoD, and mobile in addition to PayTV.”
