NAB Show: OpenDrives Unveils Vendor-Agnostic Software Solution

OpenDrives, the global provider of enterprise-scale, software-led storage solutions trusted by Fox Sports, HBO, Spotify and hundreds more, unveiled today its open ecosystem solution at the NAB Show (through April 27 in Las Vegas). Powered by Atlas, the centralized hub for accessing, managing and moving data with a single pane of glass, the solution bridges software, hardware and services to provide workflow solutions that are flexible, modular and scalable, and fully agnostic.

“Media workflows require scale-up, scale-out infrastructures at an enterprise level–monolithic, single-vendor products are not built for modularity to keep pace,” said Sean Lee, OpenDrives chief strategy and operations officer. “As former creatives, producers and studio engineers, OpenDrives understands that data is only as valuable as the ability to access, manage and transfer it. Every workflow, from feature film to live broadcast, has individual complexities — the open ecosystem provides the full range of solutions that drive performance outcomes, no matter the size, scale or location.”

OpenDrives uses open protocols and standards to future-proof the entire data lifecycle, no matter the scale, size or location. By integrating best-in-class solutions partners, such as Creative Mobile Solutions (CMSI), EVS, Western Digital and Signiant, OpenDrives has created the industry’s first open ecosystem that is purpose-built to liberate data. Customers, including Fox Sports, have already begun to benefit from high-performant throughput rates and read/write speeds while eliminating redundant, patchwork products that are detrimental to the bottom line.

For media trailblazers like Fox Sports, where global viewership, a rapid shift to IP and UHD/4K content (and soon 8K) puts data-heavy demands on workflows, OpenDrives has already proven to power both the speed and simplicity for a seamless end-user and viewer experience.

“Legacy systems required a ground-up restructure before every location filming and, worse, were prone to catastrophic hardware failures,” said Kevin Callahan, Fox Sports VP of field operations and engineering. “Dozens of ultra-high-definition cameras, simultaneous live feeds and multi-million viewer events required flexibility and scale. OpenDrives provided the open and agnostic infrastructure we needed to put on our largest events and we put it to the test.”

Fox Sports experienced a 3X throughput rate when switching to an open ecosystem for NASCAR 2021. Capital and operational expenditures plummeted when combining OpenDrives’ software integrations, including containerization and virtualization, with its 2U form factor hardware. Most recently, Fox Sports implemented the open ecosystem for the United States Football League reboot.

“Our data functioned seamlessly under two-petabyte stress with multiple HelmetCams, up to 16  microphones per team and our Megalodon,” Callahan added. “OpenDrives has given us the confidence in our system, and ecosystem of solutions, to power the 80 live feed cameras and 8,000 mile location-to-editing room distance for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022.”

Open Ecosystem Solutions Come to Life at NAB Show 2022

OpenDrives is showcasing its software-led storage solutions that are redefining media and entertainment infrastructures with:

• Atlas Core – the underlying software system that’s revolutionizing multi-vendor, multi-cloud solutions with a seamless framework that connects partner solutions quickly and simply.
• Ultra Hardware Platform – the built-for-live-broadcast network-attached-storage (NAS) solution that provides scale up and scale out capabilities to match individual complexities and performance demands with a much smaller form factor.
• Hybrid Cloud – Atlas and Ultra are powered by the open and agnostic ecosystem. Atlas can now manage OpenDrives’ own Atlas Cloud Plus and AWS storage, with future support for Google Cloud Platforms and Azure services.

Atlas and Ultra form a seamless solution for increasingly remote-first, enterprise-scale businesses to match on-prem performance from anywhere in the world for:

• Better Broadcasting – Data needs to be instantly accessible and movable from anywhere at any time. OpenDrives’ Ultra hardware enabled Fox Sports to scale up storage on-site, save on rack space and overall footprint. Altas software powered 4X read/write speeds.
• Premiere Post-Production – Media from camera card to storage to workstation must move without conversion or compression. OpenDrives provided lightning-fast setup and speed to complete–fully remote–Dave Grohl’s documentary “What Drives Us” during lockdowns.
• Next-Gen Architecture – Hybrid cloud today is designed for products that handle single-tasked, linear architectures. The flexibility from an open ecosystem anticipates ever-evolving needs as more businesses shift to the cloud and content gets richer.

An open ecosystem also unlocks a cross-category network of experts to provide the right service and support to drive individual performance needs and outcomes. Implementation and training divisions, industry technologists and engineers, customer service and post production veterans — these are the teams that guarantee the shift from single-vendor products to an open ecosystem of solutions is as seamless as implementing, deploying and using the systems themselves.

Tom Coughlin, analyst and consultant at Coughlin Associates, said: “Most storage vendors don’t have all the technical capability to be truly hardware or software agnostic. Media organizations need excellence in execution across their storage and cloud solutions. No one company has all the answers for this complex ecosystem. Using open standards and open APIs, so that media organizations can choose best-fit vendors, provides needed flexibility. Multi-vendor, multi-cloud solutions provide a pathway to optimizing the data storage in the media and entertainment industry.”

Architecting the Future of Enterprise Data Storage Rooted in M&E

Founded in 2011 to handle the first 6K film for David Fincher’s Gone Girl, OpenDrives has scaled from cutting-edge NAS solutions built for media and entertainment by veteran industry experts.

Lee added: “It will be the freedom of interoperability and data, and true ‘coopetition’ among solution providers, that will bring storage architecture into the future. Our vendor-agnostic open ecosystem solution at NAB Show 2022 is just the beginning.”