MUMBAI: Tata Communications is building a global cloud-based media platform for VICE Media to enable the company’s producers and editors around the world to collaborate as if they were together in the same location. This represents a major shift in how VICE Media’s 5,000 employees work together.

Previously, VICE Media stored its content on premise which made teamwork challenging between different studios.

Tata Communications, a leading provider of A New World of Communications™, has been chosen by VICE Media to build a high-performance, completely cloud-based platform for global media asset management, storage, content contribution and distribution. It will enable VICE Media to capture content anywhere in the world, and quickly make it available to hundreds of editors in production centres in New York City, Los Angeles, Washington DC, Toronto and London, for publishing and broadcasting across VICE Media channels.

The new platform is underpinned by Tata Communications’ Media Ecosystem, which offers VICE Media a full set of media solutions. It includes the Video Connect service, which complements VICE Media’s local area network and provides the company with a global area network of video contribution and IP connectivity. With speeds of up to 10Gbps, Video Connect enables a seamless transfer of video files and remote collaboration between VICE Media teams across different geographies as if they were in the same location.

The Media Ecosystem is also equipped with Tata Communications’ IZO™ Cloud Storage, which provides VICE Media with secure, reliable private cloud-based media storage for read-write access and archival of data-intensive video files. Previously, some of these files were stored on-premise which made teamwork challenging between different studios. All VICE Media’s files, including videos in HD, 4K and UHD formats, are also now replicated in multiple private cloud locations around the world in real-time for back-up and disaster recovery. Additionally, Tata Communications has integrated VICE Media’s media asset management and file acceleration tools into the new bespoke platform, creating an end-to-end solution for around 5,000 VICE Media employees around the world.

VICE Media’s offering spans across broadcast and OTT channels such as VICE News, VICE Sports, Noisey (music), Motherboard (technology and science), Broadly (women’s interest), i-D (fashion) and Tonic (health and fitness), among many others. Content on these channels consists of news reports, live and recorded events, documentaries and a wide range of other types of videos.

“We need to be able operate seamlessly across all platforms to reach a global audience with our content,” said VICE Media vice president of IT Ariel Rubio. “To do this, we need a powerful, well connected platform that enables us to collaborate as if we were together in the same location. Working with Tata Communications, we are able to get a LAN experience in a WAN environment, underpinned by the company’s global network.”

“VICE Media’s needs reflect a growing trend in the media and entertainment market, whereby there is a huge pressure to quench audiences’ thirst for live events, big and small, as they happen around the world, and bring viewers enhanced experiences through higher quality formats such as 4K and UHD,” said Tata VP & GM - global media and entertainment services Brian Morris.

“In this high-pressure environment that is being transformed by digital technologies, you need an infrastructure that is completely integrated across media asset management, storage, content contribution and distribution. That is what we are creating for VICE Media, with the aim of empowering the company continue on its path of phenomenal growth in this rapidly evolving market.”

“VICE Media is a new media company using IP-based broadcast infrastructure to achieve greater velocity and overcome geographical boundaries,” said ABI Research VP Sam Rosen. “Tata Communications provides the glue that holds this solution together with IP transport and storage capabilities, bringing content to central locations, between central locations and studios, and feeding the distribution network when assets are ready to publish. The use of IP within broadcast supports the need for rapid support of nascent standards including 4K, 8K, high dynamic range (HDR) and 360 video.”

Tata Communications’ media and cloud services are underpinned by the world’s largest subsea fibre network of its kind, creating an end-to-end, completely integrated solution for VICE Media. Today, over 25% of the world’s Internet routes travel over Tata Communications’ network and the company is the only Tier-1 IP network provider that is in the top five by routes in five continents.