Microsoft Highlights Innovative Digital Media Solutions at NAB

LAS VEGAS, April 13 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- This week at the 2010 National Association of Broadcasters Show (NAB), Microsoft Corp. demonstrates a range of digital media and entertainment solutions to help the industry simplify the digital supply chain and bring the experiences consumers desire across the many screens in their lives. Microsoft's comprehensive digital entertainment strategy helps streamline the entire digital supply chain for media and entertainment companies and encompasses a range of solutions including the Digital Content Management (DCM) Framework, media business management and digital content experiences.

(Logo:  http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20000822/MSFTLOGO)

"In today's competitive digital marketplace, media organizations and service operators are seeking ways to reduce complexities, simplify the digital supply chain and bring high-quality content to many screens: TV, PC, mobile and beyond," said Gabriele Di Piazza, managing director for Media and Entertainment in the Communications Sector at Microsoft. "We believe our strategy of offering an integrated set of digital media solutions can help automate processes, create diverse monetization models and ultimately provide consumers with the best possible experiences."

Microsoft announced widespread industry support for its media and entertainment solutions that simplify the digital supply chain. Ascent Media Group LLC, CTV, KUOW, Major League Soccer, NBC Sports, ProSiebenSat.1 Group AG and Sport1, among others, are working with Microsoft to streamline their content creation, management and delivery processes, bringing premium quality entertainment experiences to multiple screens.

Microsoft is showcasing a common set of solutions and technologies for playback, delivery and content protection that allow anytime, anywhere access to content across a wide range of devices. Recent advances demonstrated at NAB include the following:

• Microsoft is working with Intel Corporation and Broadcom Corp. to deliver Silverlight support for system-on-a-chip (SOC) reference designs that will provide the complete Microsoft Silverlight platform to set-top boxes, connected TVs, Blu-ray Disc players and other consumer devices.
• Enhanced functionality for Internet Information Services (IIS) Media Services 4, which includes multiplatform delivery with content protection, smooth multicast support and integrated encoding support.
• Microsoft PlayReady, the company's content access and protection technology, now adopted by more than 150 companies, has secured an additional customer implementation — Samsung Electronics Company Ltd. PlayReady is compatible with the Protected Interoperable File Format (PIFF), version 1.1 specification, which is now available at http://learn.iis.net/page.aspx/685/protected-interoperable-file-format.
• As announced at MIX10, Microsoft now offers new tools and resources to enable developers to take advantage of the rich Silverlight and Microsoft XNA feature set to create and deploy high-performance, compelling mobile applications for Windows Phone 7.
• Microsoft Mediaroom 2.0, the next version of the world's most deployed Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) platform, announced at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) earlier this year, enables TV service providers to deliver advanced TV services to multiple screens including the TV, Windows Media Center, Web browsers (for Windows-based PCs and Macs), Xbox 360, and compatible smartphones.

Microsoft also released a new solution, the Silverlight Rough Cut Editor (RCE), to simplify the editing and publishing process for delivering exciting content to the Web. RCE is a real-time, cross-platform, cross-browser video and metadata editing solution that dramatically speeds content creation and supports robust advertising delivery scenarios. The solution also eliminates the need for transcoding and additional storage if operating on top of IIS Smooth Streaming content.

"Two critical goals for coverage of the Vancouver Olympics were speed of delivery and cost," said Perkins Miller, senior vice president of Digital Media, NBC Sports. "The Silverlight Rough Cut Editor helped us achieve those goals by enabling editors to cut short-form highlights from long-form live coverage through a Web-based editor and have them published to the site within seconds — even while the event was still in progress. This dramatically reduced our costs and made it easier and faster to deliver video."

In addition to the Rough Cut Editor, Microsoft released a new set of solution frameworks that will make it easier for media organizations to create and enhance digital content while, at the same time, building their media services: Silverlight Analytics Framework, Silverlight Media Framework 2.0, Media Business Intelligence Framework, and Editorial Collaboration and Mobile Journalism.

Microsoft Presence at the 2010 NAB Show

Microsoft and select partners are showcasing a number of products and solutions at the Microsoft booth (SL220), spanning the entire content life cycle. Digital content management demonstrations will be shown by Avanade and Xytech, DAVID Systems GmbH, and TechPath. Industry partners Media Aspects, a division of Interdyn AKA; Ascent Media; Capgemini U.S. LLC; CGS Inc.; Decentrix Inc.; Hitachi Consulting Corp.; RightsLine Software Inc.; and Streamline Solutions will demonstrate simplified digital supply chain management. Microsoft also will showcase how to deliver unique digital marketing and experiences across multiple screens with demonstrations from CSG Systems' Content Direct, FAST, Microsoft Silverlight, Microsoft Mediaroom, Windows Media Center, UI Centric and Lumio.

In conjunction with its activities at NAB, Microsoft is also launching Silverlight 4 at the DevConnections/ASP.NET and Silverlight conference in Las Vegas, April 13, 2010.

More information about Microsoft's presence at the 2010 NAB Show is available at http://www.microsoft.com/media.

Founded in 1975, Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) is the worldwide leader in software, services and solutions that help people and businesses realize their full potential.

SOURCE Microsoft Corp.