Bitmovin Launches Cloud-Agnostic Video Encoding Solution

Bitmovin, a provider of online streaming video technology, announced today Bitmovin Cloud Connect, a new offering that enables over-the-top (OTT) content providers working on Google Cloud Platform (GCP), Amazon Web Services (AWS), and Azure platforms to deploy Bitmovin’s encoding solution in their existing cloud. Bitmovin Cloud Connect is a new offering that may be used simultaneously with the company’s Bitmovin Managed Cloud. The company says the combination of these two services provides developers with more flexibility and added failover capabilities.

While Bitmovin’s Managed Cloud service provides a state-of-the-art development environment for integrating Bitmovin’s encoding capabilities, companies already using a cloud provider may find it advantageous — and in many cases, a requirement — to work within their current provider’s environment. For those customers, Bitmovin Cloud Connect offers a vendor-agnostic service that allows them to stay in one secure environment and encode where their content already resides. Bitmovin Cloud Connect enables customers to:

• Leverage chunk-based encoding within GCP, AWS and Azure.
• Fully leverage existing security measures and discounts that may be part of their cloud provider contracts.
• Better manage their current cloud resources and infrastructure.
• Leverage the same “split and stitch” approach using spot instances to ensure the same stable and cost-effective horizontal scale advantage that Bitmovin’s Managed Cloud service provides.
• Use their own cloud environments in tandem with the Bitmovin Managed Cloud for maximum developer flexibility and additional fault tolerance.

“When it comes to encoding, Bitmovin takes an interesting approach by not only providing hosted encoding solutions in the cloud, but also a software-only option where customers can deploy their encoding software within the customer’s cloud account,” said Dan Rayburn, principal analyst, Streaming Media Expert. “Leveraging these cloud options together with a software-only approach like Bitmovin offers for encoding, is a great way for some customers to benefit when it comes to costs and choosing the best cloud vendor as part of their best-in-breed strategy. It also gives companies flexibility by not being locked into one cloud provider.”

As cloud encoding services have matured they have become attractive options to OTT content providers, who require scalable encoding infrastructure that can deliver a high-quality viewing experience and low latency at an affordable cost. This has sparked a significant movement toward the cloud, as evidenced by Bitmovin’s annual Developer Report — 32% of respondents already leverage a cloud encoding service, while on-premise encoding has fallen by 6% over the past year.

“Many of our customers have made significant investments in cloud services,” said Stefan Lederer, Bitmovin CEO and Co-founder. “Additionally, many organizations have strict security guidelines that mandate the work be done within their current environment. With Bitmovin Cloud Connect, customers will have the flexibility to take advantage of all of Bitmovin’s benefits in the comfort and safety of their own development environment.”