Primeran: desafíos y decisiones rupturistas en la nueva plataforma OTT de EITB

In this gallery, Igor Jainaga Irastorza, director of Technology and Operation of EITB Media, previews what the new Primeran OTT platform will be like: an initiative to accommodate the Basque audiovisual world with a firm commitment to UX and an unprecedented model in Basque radio and television.

Perfect is EITB Media's next big project: a OTT is a multi-platform that will be accessible from many media and that is intended to bring together content Basques and in Basque. Movies, series, documentaries, programs, children's formats and all types of future developments will have a place in this initiative.

It will be a VOD concept with on-demand content, but it will go much further. Our commitment is to offer numerous streaming content linked to singular elements related to the context of the platform, such as a popular festival. Primeran plans to launch around San Sebastian's Zinemaldia on the web, iOS, Android, Samsung and LG, which are the portfolio of portals that we consider most urgent and necessary. In the short term, we will reach HbbTV, and then we will go to Android TV, Apple TV, Amazon Fire, HiSense, Panasonic and Sony.

EITB Media works as coordinator and executor of this platform, but our goal is to reach out to all types of partners who want to be part of our offer. We want any consumer of content in Basque to find in this single point the highest possible offer. And we will not only restrict it to a local content generator, but to any agent that allows us to distribute their content in Basque within this ecosystem.

We will start with an approximate catalog of just over 2,000 hours of initial content, but our idea is to continue providing content weekly in order to consolidate this digital window open to the world of Basque.

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External development for Primeran

In recent times we have been betting on a new technology management that allows us to respond quickly to both the needs of EITB and the constant changes in the market and consumer habits, optimally balancing the internal resources of the core of activity (in-house) with respect to external products and services ( outsourcing).

Perfect It is the first project core that we take it out service model.

Primeran is the first project core that we take it out service model. We have opted for this tender to resolve the particularities that the adaptation of the platform to all the client applications, choosing a service base of a minimum of two years with three optional years, until reaching a maximum availability of five years. As a reference, our approximate budget for this period is five million euros.

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Why a service model?

The market demand is massive. EITB Media has its own digital distribution platforms, but the truth is that the emergence of dozens of platforms has set the standard very high. Furthermore, this requires adaptability and functionalities that must always be in place. continuous development. With our own resources, it was impossible for us to reach the rhythms of the market, so the only way we saw feasible was to opt for an external platform under a service model. It is a new strategy that, for us, has meant an important conceptual change. This is a new technology management at EITB.

Con own resources, will not be Impossible to keep pace with the market, so the only way we saw feasible was to opt for a external platform.

The world of OTT platforms is so fast and disruptive, that no one knows what the audiovisual ecosystem will be like in five years, when the possible extension of the service ends. At that time, we will study if there is a new type of platform with new functionalities or what kind of consumption our audience does. Even so, we have proposed a scenario of migration, so that all the content work and metadata What we are doing for Primeran could be transferred to our hypothetical future service, which would surely require the development or adaptation of the client applications and part of the platform.

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Leap in quality and service

Choosing a service model also allows us to integrate new strategic features with leaps of improvement in what we already offered in our apps and on-demand content. For example, let's put our minimum standard at Full HD, which will allow us to take a leap in quality. In addition, we will include features such as DRM, which will be included both in our own content and in those of partners; possible options pay per view, with the aim of accommodating all the exploitation models of our partners and helping them feel comfortable, or content in UHD, since at EITB Media we will soon begin to make small projects in 4K and, when these are likely to be on the platform, we want them to be there.

Another very important point for us is the question of player, which we want to be “at the level of the state of the art.” We have the objective of achieving a user experience equivalent to what people have on platforms like Netflix, HBO or other market references. In this regard, in addition to the various playback options, we are devoting a lot of effort to the issue of subtitles, also in Basque.

We have the objective of achieving a user experience equivalent to what people have on platforms like Netflix, HBO or other market references.

With Primeran, we will also be able to reinforce everything that has to do with data and analytics. In order to provide quality service in the future, we have to be able to know what types of content are most consumed or how the platform is used. So we can better understand the user and offer you the greatest possible added value. Within this point, we have also wanted to develop everything that is the recommendation algorithms, which will allow us to achieve more engagement and offer people the best products within the platform.

To be able to give all these possibilities to users, we have dared to take another small leap: make registration necessary, which was not necessary on our previous platforms. This way we can provide a higher quality offer, encourage the community to grow, know the user better and even have strategies for generating content or attracting partners based on consumption. It's nothing new, but they are small milestones for us who take us to give a little revolution.

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Challenges hidden in the contents

One of the most important goals we have set for ourselves has been to be able to take photographs with the major reference platforms. In this process, there are many elements that are very important, such as user experience or the management of metadatos.

In the construction of Perfect, we have discovered that everything surrounding the content has been a little challenge.

In building Primeran, we have found that everything surrounding content has been a bit of a challenge. The user experience, going to the multi-platform, multi-environment and multi-device world, requires that the contents are very well dressed: vertical and horizontal covers, different resolutions... In addition, the metadata has to be very complete, since when you go to the product sheet you want to have all the information.

This has not posed any problem with new or recent content, because that information has been able to be worked on or it already came from the market. The problem is all the file content, which can be very interesting for the platform, but in many cases part of the information is missing to complete it correctly: documentation, graphic generation, creation of mini-trailers...

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New philosophy at EITB

Another internal change is the concept of the importance of distribution on an OTT platform. Above all, with the pandemic, and the consolidation of many services, even more importance has been given to this type of dissemination of content. He already put us in focus, but Primeran is forcing us to rethink the value of this type of broadcasts and platforms facing the market.

The shelf is vital, but also how you present it to on-demand consumption platforms, which has led us to align our processes and resources. This causes us to rethink workflows and include new tasks in our natural processes of publishing and managing television content.

Es mandatory integrate into the platform like a distribution route of our ecosystem.

We want to get Perfect It is understood as another window within EITB Media. There will be content that will premiere first on the platform and then go online; others that go from the shelf to form the platform's wardrobe, and others that come from outside and have their own roadmap. To adapt to the three paths, in one sense or another, it is mandatory to integrate the platform as a distribution channel for our ecosystem.

A final point that redefines our operations is the new way of managing the entire ecosystem of our own product and partners from the point of editorial view. Until now, all the publishing work was left at home, but now, having to coexist in the ecosystem with different partners, we will have to look for the balances to achieve the best possible coexistence.

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Primeran, among many other platforms

At EITB Media we are aware that Primeran was born in a context of extreme competition. but there is tres claves which we are working on to ensure that it is well received.

The first is that the environment you approach is attractive and friendly enough so that it is not a point of rejection. We are trying to have a platform in line with the state of the art. The second clear strategy is that our target it is differential. We cannot distinguish ourselves by exclusive quantity or quality of content because that is what the superplataformas with their budgets of another range. Our position at the moment is one of differentiation. We want those who want to consume content in Basque the letter has as its main reference to Primeran. Third, although we will begin with an a la carte approach, we will be open to live broadcasts of events. The uniqueness of these celebrations or events that we can convey, if it is sufficiently attractive and given the importance it deserves, is a value in itself.

We trust until the end in the Primeran differentiation, given that compete with other options It would be a chimera, die trying.

Primeran will accommodate everything that has to do with the context of the platform, which is the content Basque or in Basque. We trust until the end in that differentiation, since competing with other options would be a chimera, dying trying. It is difficult to say this in an environment where everything changes so quickly, but we believe that we are giving the proper steps to ensure that our platform offers an experience and valuable content to all those who want to discover our great audiovisual heritage.

Igor Jainaga Irastorza

Director of Technology and Operation EITB Media

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