IBM is demonstrating that it’s serious about video this week with a series of new customer announcements and technology enhancements that it says make it possible to provide live, high-quality video anywhere in the world with sub-one-second startup delays and a “glitch-free viewing experience.”

Among the new customers of the company’s new Cloud Video unit are Comic-Con HQ, AOL Inc., Canadian Broadcasting Corp, Broadway Video Entertainment Inc. and Mazda Motor Corp. for the launch of its 2017 Mazda MX-5 Miata RF (above). Most of the customers are deploying IBM’s full suite of cloud video services, including quality of service, content management, data management and network traffic analysis.

IBM’s video platform has been mostly assembled through a whirlwind series of acquisitions, beginning with Aspera Inc. in December, 2013 and continuing with Cleversafe Inc. in October, Clearleap Inc. in December and Ustream Inc. in January.

New line of business

Although not traditionally thought of as a force in streaming media, IBM thinks the technology demands of streaming video map nicely to its portfolio of storage, data management, analytics and cognitive computing products. Moreover, the company is betting that video is about to explode as a corporate communications medium for everything from customer support to marketing to internal meetings.

“We’re trying to be a complete provider to enable enterprises to ingest, store, manipulate and manufacture video content,” said Jim Comfort, general manager of cloud development and delivery in IBM’s Global Technology Services division.

Comfort ticked off what he called the most immediate opportunities. Media companies are the first, of course, as evidenced by IBM’s new-customer announcements today. For example, CBC’s video service will make over 600 titles available on demand with ad customization and tracking.

“Education is huge,” Comfort said. “Millennials all expect rich content and I don’t think there’s an education application being built that doesn’t have video capability.” IBM is also going after opportunities behind the firewall in corporate training networks.

The company is also betting that equipment maintenance will be enhanced by the ability to capture video images for remote support. And by overlaying Watson analytics on video images, IBM expects to open up new applications in marketing, security and health care. “Watson provides the insight on who you’re engaging with and what they might want,” Comfort said.

Most of these services are being delivered over the IBM’s SoftLayer cloud, and cloud computing is broadening the base of potential customers, Comfort asserted. “Cloud is about abstracting complexity and making capability available to more and more people,” he said. Mazda is an example of that. The company recently live-streamed the launch of the Miata MX-5 from the New York Auto Show, reaching an audience of over 40,000 viewers with an event that is usually limited to a few press and analysts.

IBM also used this week’s National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas to roll out a new streaming video technology based upon Aspera’s FASPStream open video transport software. IBM said FASPStream is the first technology to enable high-quality live streaming over commodity Internet WANs. FASP can transport any live video source –  including local multicast, unicast User Datagram Protocol (UDP), TCP or growing file source –  with less than five seconds of start-up delay and three percent packet loss for a 50 megabit-per-second video stream. IBM said the technology is sufficient for streaming 4K-quality between continents, and that the global reach of its SoftLayer data centers gives it an edge for international applications. “The network that we own is the size of a tier-two carrier in itself.

However, he stressed that IBM has no interest in competing with telecommunications carriers. “We are not trying to be a transport provider,” he said. “The end mile will always be the local telcos.”

Image courtesy Mazda Motors Corp.