Sony and Deutsche Telekom are combining Sony’s expertise in cameras, encoding and media orchestration with Telekom’s developments in 5G networking, for use in broadcast services.
Sony Corporation and Deutsche Telekom are working together to combine Sony’s expertise in cameras, encoding, IoT and media orchestration with Deutsche Telekom’s developments in 5G networking.
The availability of 5G networks continues to grow and with it the benefits of faster connectivity, lower network latency, and the potential for new ways of working through network slicing. The two organisations are conducting trials to apply Deutsche Telekom’s dynamic network slicing to new contribution and production workflows used in the media industry.
Their goal is to address connectivity challenges that can exist within today’s live networked production ecosystems, especially for events where high quality and consistent video contribution is required between in-field camera operators, outside broadcast service providers, and distributed creative teams.
The network architecture of 5G network slicing allows virtualised and independent logical networks to co-exist on the same physical network infrastructure. Each network ‘slice’ is an isolated, complete network tailored to meet the specific demands of a particular application. Carriers can reduce the cost of building multiple private networks and instead focus on flexible network services that can be scheduled and allocated on demand, based on service requirements.
Through dynamic slicing, 5G network resources can be allocated based on the required number of 5G connected devices, which becomes a critical option when professional camera feeds need to be prioritised. Combined with Sony’s camera, IoT and orchestration tools, this new kind of service opens the way for media companies such as a news organisation to secure a guaranteed part of the available 5G network for their own purposes at pre-planned events.
The application of Sony’s new Ultra Low Latency HEVC codec technology also allows HD or Ultra HD images from the camera to be transferred via the network slice in a highly compressed, high quality and ultra-low latency process.
“Our Networked Live strategy is about enabling resources – places, people and processing – to be connected, used and shared optimally in productions – regardless of their location,” commented Norbert Paquet, Head of Live Production, Sony Europe. “5G is a key component of this strategy. In live environments, be they news or events, producers are always balancing the need for speed and the need for reliability. Our initial trials with Deutsche Telekom this summer highlighted how many opportunities 5G unlocks when powered by a public network with a dedicated access and an efficient codec.”
Changsoon Choi, Vice President, Network Service Differentiation and Convergence, Deutsche Telekom, said, “Following the success of our initial trials, we look forward to extending our collaboration with Sony to use features like 5G network slicing for services and products that will make broadcasting and media production faster and simpler.”
The first phase of the collaboration is focussing on developing the means to connect a 5G mobile device to to the slicing platform. pro.sony
