Alliance for IP Media Solutions launches


Details

Joseph O'Halloran

| 15 December 2015




Some of the largest broadcast and media industry suppliers have come together to promote open standards and interoperability in IP for broadcasters.



The new Alliance for IP Media Solutions (AIMS) includes the likes of Grass Valley, Imagine Communications, Lawo and Snell Advanced Media, and has the stated aim of bringing IP solutions to market that offer ‘complete interoperability, are based on open standards, and integrate seamlessly into media workflow environments to foster industry innovation and efficiency’.

The alliance believes that as broadcasters and other media companies look to use IP workflows to speed and streamline the movement and management of increasingly complex content and adapt their businesses to better compete with other content options such as over-the-top (OTT), open standards are the key to protecting current investments and ensuring long-term interoperability.

Initially, AIMS will prioritise three key strategies: initiatives that facilitate the education and adoption of open standards; facilitation of activities that accelerate the development of solutions that support these open standards; and nurturing the creation of new standards by supporting standards bodies with participation and testing in real-world environments.

Efforts will be focused on promoting the adoption, standardisation, development and refinement of open protocols for media over IP, with an initial emphasis on VSF TR-03 and TR-04, SMPTE 2022-6 and AES67.

“The foundation of AIMS is the pursuit and acceleration of open standards aligned with the media and entertainment industry,” commented Imagine Communications CEO Charlie Vogt. “The transition to IP, SDN and cloud solutions is essential for our clients to create, move, manage and monetise video content in the most efficient, flexible and agile manner. Without AIMS, the industry would be required to adopt proprietary approaches that hinder innovation, reduce deployment flexibility and paint broadcasters into a single-vendor corner that isolates them from the economic and performance benefits of an open ecosystem and marketplace.”