Open Caching: Tame the Growth of Internet Video Demand

As consumers continue to cut the cord and switch to the internet for their video needs, the associated increase in bandwidth can be a headache for everyone involved. Service Providers see an increase in data flowing across their network, consumers experience degraded stream quality as their access networks become congested, and Content Providers struggle to satisfy their end users who want dependable high-bitrate streams and low rebuffering rates. A lose-lose-lose situation.

Streaming video subscribers demand the highest quality video experiences and will often blame the Content Providers or their Service Provider when they don’t receive it. With such strained networks, Service and Content Providers are looking for future-proof ways to manage the continuing surges in video streaming demand, and potentially generate new revenue opportunities along with it.

Open Caching is the silver bullet for the growing pains of all three parties in this dilemma.

Open Caching is a standard, non-proprietary API specification developed by members of the Streaming Video Technology Alliance (SVTA). It exists to standardize the way Content Providers and content delivery networks (CDNs) communicate, so any Content Provider can use the same consistent API to provision and cache their content across multiple CDNs. For the CDNs and Service Providers, it means that a single industry standard configuration API is all that is required to be immediately compatible with any upstream Content Provider.

With the proper use of Open Caching, Service Providers can cache third-party video content directly within their own networks and ease upstream capacity in their network, lower the cost of using external CDNs, and improve application performance, as well as reduce the backend load and create opportunities for new revenue streams. The “cherry on top” is that their subscribers will thank them as they enjoy the highest bit rate video streaming, with zero rebuffering. Win-win-win!

Vecima leverages our industry-leading IP Video Cache and has extended it to support the SVTA’s Open Caching APIs.  We call the result MediaScale^TM Open CDN.  We recently demonstrated that our Open CDN can easily be provisioned via Open Caching APIs and successfully deliver cached video content on behalf of an upstream CDN.

How Open Caching Solves the Problem

Without Open Caching, the video viewers in a typical network architecture must wait for video data to be delivered from the Content Provider’s origin server, passed through a public CDN and finally transited across their Service Provider’s network into their home. All that data transiting invites congestion, cost, latency and the dreaded rebuffering of video for the end viewer.

Figure 1 – Typical congestion when transiting third-party video content through a Service Provider’s network.

Instead, by deploying Vecima’s Open CDN within a Service Providers network and making that caching resource available to third party content providers, much of those undesirable overheads can be eliminated.

Figure 2 – Congestion avoided when Open Caching is used to cache video content within a Service Provider’s network

By working with Vecima’s Open CDN, content owners can reduce transport fees to public CDNs while enabling higher-quality, lower-latency video for the end viewer. At the same time, service providers can decrease bandwidth on backbone and interconnects, improve video quality by intelligently streaming content from local caches, and provide a new source of revenue.

Open Caching technology is only half the story. We’re outlining a business model for both the streaming content owner and the Service Provider that will fundamentally change how streaming video is managed and monetized.

It’s time to reclaim cost, quality, and capacity. It’s time for Open Caching with Vecima Open CDN.

Vecima will be demonstrating MediaScale Open CDN and the benefits it can deliver at SCTE Cable-Tec Expo in Denver, Booth 1331. Book a meeting with us at sales@vecima.com.