Espial's MediaBase Platform Powering VOD Services for China's Chongqing Cable TV Network

Espial, the Canadian digital TV software company that last year bought US IPTV and video-on-demand technology provider, Kasenna (note: the deal valued Kasenna, which had raised $90 million in funding since its launch in 2000, at around $6.5 million), will today announce that Chinese tier-one cable operator, Chongqing Cable TV Network, has selected its Espial MediaBase VOD platform to power its VOD services. Espial acquired the MediaBase product line through the Kasenna purchase. Chongqing Cable TV Network, which is located in southwest China, claims to provide analog and digital TV services to 4.2 million subscribers. According to Espial, the operator is already using the MediaBase platform to power VOD, TV-on-demand, network PVR and timeshift-TV services, and will begin converting its entire subscriber base to digital TV over the next few years.

Espial claims that Chongqing selected MediaBase for the following reasons: because the platform is tightly integrated with Huawei's business management solution for cable operators (Huawei is Chongqing's preferred system integrator); because the platform's multi-tiered, multicast content distribution networking and server clustering features enables the operator to overcome backbone network bandwidth constraints; because it allows the operator to fine-tune its VOD hardware and software configurations for each of its service regions; because it allows the operator to differentiate its user experience with a range of on-demand services and features, such as instant playback for timeshift-TV services; and because it enables the operator to achieve a low overall cost of ownership for the various advanced features it supports, thus enabling it to distribute content and provide on-demand services to users in several cities, including Yiran, Baligongshe, Tianlong and Hongxing. "We selected Espial MediaBase for its great track record delivering a superior VOD system to IPTV and cable operators across the world," Chongqing Cable TV Network executive, X. F. Lee, said in a prepared statement. "It offers excellent cost to performance; ease of installation and operations; a rich feature set including nPVR, TVOD, TSTV and VOD; and is tightly integrated with and locally supported by Huawei, our preferred integrator. Using Espial MediaBase we can attract new subscribers today and differentiate against our competition for the future." Added James Chou, Espial's country manager for Greater China and its director of sales for Asia: "Chongqinq Cable TV Network's selection of Espial MediaBase was based on its high performance, excellent features and broad set of on-demand services. As well, by using commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware, Espial was able to tailor the server and storage exactly to their requirements for each service region. These are all essential
capabilities to meet China's digital TV market requirements."