Content Owners Buying Encoders to Bypass Pay TV

According to ABI Research, content owners - including HBO, Disney/ABC and Fox - are growing in importance as customers for video encoders and transcoders. Content owners have always purchased some video encoders for primary distribution, which feed into existing pay TV systems; however, their investment is increasingly in multi-format transcoders that support direct-to-consumer distribution.The research house expects content owners to grow from 11% of the total encoder and transcoder market last year to 17% in 2017. The total encoder and transcoder markets are expected to reach $1.5 billion in 2017, led by ARRIS/Motorola and with Cisco, Ericsson, Harmonic, and Thomson Video Networks all playing strong roles. Envivio leads the file-based multiscreen market while Elemental Technologies leads the live multiscreen market.