Crosspoint: the crossing between broadcast and OTT platforms

Two years after the European specialist ES Broadcast decided to trust in the potential and experience of Crosspoint, the distributor, service provider and integrator addresses a present marked by the convergence of technologies, a renewed role in the Spanish industry and the commitment to accompany each client in achieving their objectives during planning, execution and after-sales support.

Founded in 1993, Crosspoint has overcome its three decades of life fully aware of the new challenges facing the sector media. With an initial role focused on providing the broadcast industry with those technologies that redefined television in Spain, in the last five years The company has undergone a profound transformation. This has been marked, as it could not be otherwise, by the evolution of the market and technology, but also by profound structural changes.

The most important has been the company acquisition by ES Broadcast, a group with global reach that has provided its experience, synergies and resources at the right time: a subtle but crucial transition in the operational focus and strategic of the company. And Crosspoint's role as a value-added distributor – backed by big brands such as Grass Valley, Riedel Communications o Ross Video-, is joined by a renewed ambition to accompany the client in overcoming each of its technological and operational challenges. It happens the same way with Cross media, Crosspoint's digital division focused on the OTT universe. In it, solutions prepared for present and future challenges are deployed, developed by partners as relevant as Fastly, Live o Brightcove among others.

In the words of Víctor García, general director of Crosspoint: “Beyond having all the knowledge and mastery of the solutions of the brands we distribute, and accompanying the client in the pre-sale phase, we focus on their deployment and after-sales support. To achieve this, we invest in equipment to provide the best support service; we continue certifying us and sending our staff to the brands' headquarters to be at the forefront of knowledge, and we expand our portfolio to improve the offer we offer to each of our clients.”

A renovated office for a new stage

Moving forward in this new phase of transformation, the Crosspoint team made the decision to give a 180º turn on seat and opt for a new location and layout of space. The goal? Create a more open space that is closer to the company's current operations, promoting reflection, analysis and collaboration.

the office, bright and large, is structured around a room central in which Crosspoint professionals can work together on their numerous projects. Likewise, as satellites of this axis, auxiliary and equally multidisciplinary spaces are distributed in which it is possible to maintain meetings one-to-one do it collective training sessions.

From its nine headquarters, located in the Legazpi area of Madrid, the new Crosspoint office looks to the future without losing sight of a legacy marked by great projects and professionals who left an indelible mark on the audiovisual industry. one of them is Ricardo Cuenca, former head of technology, who died last April and who had the admiration and respect of the entire profession, as well as the affection of everyone who knew him.

In this sense, García comments: “It occurred to us that the best way to honor him was to baptize the meeting room, the brightest and most prominent point of the new office, with its name. Furthermore, as a great talker and arguer that he was, we understand that a meeting room, where ideas, arguments and reflections are confronted, is the most appropriate space to honor his figure. “He was a true pillar of the company and continues to be very present for all of us.”

The search for the avant-garde in Crosspoint

The evolution of Crosspoint is inescapably linked to that of the broadcast world itself. The needs of the broadcasters They look modified, and the new technical developments allow you to imagine convergent, delocalized futures with scalable business models that need to be addressed transversally to take advantage of all their advantages. In this regard, Crosspoint is advancing in leaps and bounds on multiple fronts, but without losing perspective: the client's needs and their support to short, medium and long term They continue to guide the day-to-day operations.

In this way, the company is prepared to address the different opportunities in the broadcast universe, as explained Ricardo Casanova, sales manager. The implementation of projects in the cloud, software as a service business models (SaaS), the transition to infrastructure models IP or the consolidation of environments UHD are beginning to occupy a large part of the project teams' agendas, and Crosspoint is prepared to put its knowledge and engineering equipment at the service of every challenge.

“Under our vocation as a distributor of high added value, based on long-term relationships of trust, we offer our clients a pre-sale focused on your needs and, if you allow us, the co-creation of your projects", explains Casanova, head of a team of professionals who puts at the service of the industry a "deep knowledge of the solutions we distribute”, as well as their “ability to perform internally developments that offer new specifications, completing the integration of new products with those that the client may already have in their home.” “This tells us difference and brings great value to the products'out of the box’”, emphasizes the sales manager.

When it comes to cutting-edge platforms, Crosspoint stands as a certified partner of GV-AMPP, of Grass Valley, the “most advanced and complete broadcast ecosystem on the market” based on software applications that, as Casanova points out, “we have already implemented and are managing in first-level clients.” Likewise, the firm has incorporated “intuitive and innovative” live production and media intake solutions. SimplyLive, of Riedel, thus responding to the production demands demanded by its clients.

Without giving up its recognized momentum in cameras, top-level mixers and other production and infrastructure equipment, Crosspoint is also focused on the promotion of graphics and robotics solutions, especially with the help of Ross Video. “Both lines perfectly complement our portfolio,” says Casanova, who also highlights the company's role as a distributor of optics and PTZ cameras with the help of Canon. “We can also offer native IP/UHD processing solutions based on software and running on FPGA accelerator boards of Arkona-Manifold. And, to all this, we can add the options of repurchase and supply of used equipment and exdemo with access to a large stock of material, many times practically new,” he explains.

Crossmedia, the ambitious digital aspect of Crosspoint

Born to respond to the challenges of digital convergence of television, Crossmedia, Crosspoint's digital division focused on the OTT world, has consolidated itself in the market by accompanying companies in their digital transformation processes. Deeply aware of the transformation of viewers' consumption habits, in which applications coexist with more traditional channels, the Crossmedia team has accumulated deep experience that allows it to position itself as one of the most experienced companies in the Spanish ecosystem.

Content distribution, application development, implementation of AI tools or CDN management They require in-depth knowledge to accompany the user throughout their journey. That particular trip, including monitoring your activity or personalization of your experience, drives much of the purpose of a Crossmedia that looks like this know-how It also benefits multiple content owners far from the media sector: from sports clubs to cultural organizations.

“Launch a service OTT For a television it represents not only a technological challenge, but also a internal rectum to adapt the available means and be able to set up a new puzzle. And, in Cross media"We are specialists in each of the pieces that make up this particular puzzle."

All of these agents need a detailed service that allows them to exploit their full potential, and the Crossmedia division, led by Jorge Frias, continues to move forward with the firm purpose of translating challenges into opportunities in this effervescent field, as it is full of opportunities: "It is a reality that televisions have become applications, and this fact has a great impact on the way in which content is distributed, consumed and interacted with. Launching an OTT service for a television represents not only a technological challenge, but also a internal rectum to adapt the available means and be able to set up a new puzzle. And, at Crossmedia, we are specialists in each of the pieces that make up this particular puzzle.”

For Frías, the main value of Crossmedia lies in being specialists in the integration of OTT platforms for broadcasters and other content owners with a “agnostic spirit"This approach allows us to overcome the main challenge of this OTT world: addressing a very fragmented ecosystem regarding the number and type of devices on which these applications are deployed, while continuing to work on the user experience personalization.

“To achieve this, many of the solutions that we are implementing for our clients are based on the use of IA, which is emerging as the true disruptive factor at a global level for the coming years. For this reason, it is essential to reflect on the transformative power of artificial intelligence, its application in our sector and the regulatory challenges what it entails for the entire industry,” says Frías.

A promising future and two great universes

The double aspect of Crosspoint, from the transformation of the most traditional broadcast to the good number of opportunities that have appeared in the digital field with the emergence of OTT channeled with Crossmedia, represents a source of shared knowledge own two universes in convergence. In current broadcast environments, both sides feed off each other, sharing everything from business models to technological developments.

“This knowledge of both worlds allows us to approach projects in a very holistic. We support each other between departments to choose the most suitable path for the client. In a very humble way, we dare to say that it is a highly differential value proposition in the market,” explains Víctor García, who also highlights the company's efforts in the field of cybersecurity: “In that sense, we have also dedicated great efforts to obtaining certifications such as the National Security Scheme, which allows us to face current projects with all the required solvency.”

Just like transforms the audiovisual industry, the evolution of Crosspoint does not stop. Technology structures the progress of the environment, but it is the thorough knowledge, the personalized attention, he accompaniment and the experience what can transform an idea into a fully transformative reality.

With this philosophy as the backbone of its business, Crosspoint is aware that it is taking the right path to continue accompanying each client in each project. As an example, the great challenges that it has undertaken in recent times: from the development of the recommendation system to RTVE Play, until the update of the news set of Mediaset Spain, including the supply of video scoreboard graphics equipment in the renovation of the stadium of a great football club, as well as the delivery of the routing, intercom and video mixing systems of the latest mobile units of RTVE.

To continue helping the industry achieve each and every one of its objectives, Crosspoint has recently incorporated great professionals such as David Medina, with extensive and recognized experience in the commercial area of different manufacturers and broadcast integrators, who joins as commercial manager of large accounts, or Jordi Mangas, with high knowledge of the industry and medium technology, and who, together with Jorge Polvorinos, también de dilatada trayectoria profesional desarrollada en UK, lideran el departamento preventa & tecnología del área broadcast. Asimismo, la entrada de Raquel Serrano, with notable experience in the audiovisual and streaming field, leads the ambitious digital projects undertaken by Crossmedia.

All of them join a young but highly capable and experienced team, made up of other pillars of the company such as César Rojas, Daniel Villar or Marga Maristegui; who lead, respectively, the engineering and support, digital technical management and administration areas.

Just like transforms the audiovisual industry, the evolution of Crosspoint does not stop. Technology structures the progress of the environment, but it is the thorough knowledge, the personalized attention, he accompaniment and the experience what can transform an idea into a fully transformative reality.

ByDRAFTING, Mar 18, 2025, Section:Catchment, Study, Integration, Reports

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