Orca’s Compass IPTV Content Discovery Solution Integrated with Trusted Opinion

–Orca Tapped by Vestitel to Power “Partnership IPTV” Service

At the IPTV World Forum last month, IPTV middleware and applications provider, Orca Interactive (note: the company was acquired last year by Viaccess–see [itvt] Issue 7.77 Part 1), announced the integration of its Compass personalized programming recommendation platform with social networking portal, Trusted Opinion. The company says that the resulting joint social TV solution will allow viewers to share personalized content recommendations with friends and family over the Web and to the TV.

Orca bills the Compass recommendation platform as blending user profiles, popular choices and personal usage history to build a personalized set of viewing recommendations for linear and on-demand TV content, thus allowing viewers to avoid “having to navigate their way through the confusing array of channels and programs via their EPG.” The solution’s integration with the Trusted Opinion portal “provides the added value of leveraging recommendations from the most trusted of sources–our friends,” the company says. By incorporating this new source of recommendations, Orca claims, Compass will increase the buy-rate and ARPU of an IPTV service, and expand the overall range of content accessed by viewers because viewers now have the ability to recommend and rate content to one another in a “fun and enjoyable manner.” “The interactive TV world is missing the level of interaction, sharing and recommendation of content available today on the Web,” Trusted Opinion’s founder and CEO, Shahar Smirin, said in a prepared statement. “The phenomenal viral growth and addictiveness of social networking has not yet deployed on TV, mostly because of the limitations of the TV set and its remote control. Trusted Opinion allows users to bring their social network of friends together to share great recommendations about the movies they like the most. Members find it so fun and addictive that every second user invites an average of 90 of their friends, consequently providing viral growth that is sorely missed in ‘young’ platforms such as IPTV. Trusted Opinion is proud to partner with Orca to deploy the fully integrated solution with Orca’s Compass platform, enabling TV users with instant and transparent access to recommendations from their social network right on their TV set.” Added Orca’s VP of sales and marketing, Sefy Ariely: “Compass introduced to the market a revolutionary platform to provide viewers with the ultimate personalized TV experience. Based on the success and market demand for this unique technology, we are now taking things a step further by allowing people to easily receive content recommendations from those whose opinion they value most–their friends, family and social groups. We expect that innovations like these will give our customers the tools to create growth, customer loyalty and increase customer satisfaction, thereby creating new revenue opportunities.”

In other Orca Interactive news: The company also announced last month that its RiGHTv IPTV middleware platform has been selected by Bulgarian triple-play operator, Vestitel BG, to power the latter’s own IPTV service, as well as a managed IPTV service (“partnership IPTV service”) that Vestitel is offering to other Bulgarian service providers and that is scheduled to go live at the end of this month. Orca’s middleware will replace Vestitel’s existing middleware solution.

Vestitel, a subsidiary of the Bulgarian natural gas company, launched its own IPTV service two years ago, and says it decided to leverage its investment in IPTV infrastructure by launching its new managed IPTV service. It claims that multiple operators have already signed up for the new service. According to Orca, Vestitel chose the RiGHTv middleware platform because it offered the best price/performance value, together with the ability to be customized to fit the needs of third-party operators. Vestitel was also interested in the “innovative nature” of its solution, Orca says, including the Compass recommendation technology. “We chose the RiGHTv solution because we needed a very reliable solution that is mature, adaptable and open enough to fit into our unique requirements for our service concept,” Vestitel CEO, Alexander Vaglarov, said in a prepared statement. “Since we will be selling the managed service to competitive operators, the need for each operator to be self-sufficient and able to reflect their brand and tailor the solution to fit different market segments was also of paramount importance.” Added Orca CEO, Haggai Barel: “We are convinced that the partnership IPTV model will be a very successful new development in the IPTV market place. We strongly applaud and support Vestitel’s initiative and look forward to a successful partnership in the years to come.”

Orca Interactive News:

–New Hybrid Solution for Offering Interactive Services over the Internet
–New Social TV, User Interface, Targeted Advertising Solutions
–New Fingerprint-Recognition Solution for Personalized TV

At the IBC show in Amsterdam earlier this month, Israeli IPTV middleware and applications provider, Orca Interactive, and its new corporate parent, France Telecom-subsidiary, Viaccess, launched a pre-integrated, end-to-end hybrid solution that delivers content over the open Internet. According to the companies, the new solution combines DVB linear channels with interactive services delivered over the Internet, including progressive VOD downloads, catch-up TV, push-VOD and client PVR. The companies say that the solution is targeted at broadcasters, content aggregators and IPTV service providers: they claim that it will enable IPTV service providers to “extend coverage eligibility to areas outside their current IP managed network perimeters”; that it will enable broadcasters to “compete against other digital TV providers” by offering sophisticated on-demand and catch-up TV services; and that it will allow content aggregators to “provide a content service with no need for an underlying IPTV network.” “Less than four months after the acquisition of Orca, we are already presenting this unique solution, designed to reliably secure digital media content provided via innovative applications,” Viaccess CEO, Francois Moreau de Saint Martin, said in a prepared statement. “Using our new hybrid platform, service providers, broadcasters and content aggregators will be poised to deliver new services and broaden their footprints.” Added Orca CEO, Haggai Barel: “Introducing an advanced hybrid IPTV solution with open Internet functionality marks a new era in our common work with Viaccess–and one which we expect will greatly benefit our customers and generate exciting new opportunities. The combination of Orca’s top-of-the-line middleware with Viaccess’ dynamic conditional access and content-protection capabilities creates a sure-fire winning platform with features that stand at the cutting-edge of IPTV.”

In other Orca Interactive news from the IBC:

• The company used the show to demo new social TV functionality, a new Flash user interface and targeted advertising capabilities. The new social TV functionality extends Orca’s COMPASS recommendation engine (which suggests programs based on user profiles, popular choices and individual usage history): it allows viewers to access programming recommendations made by their friends, and interfaces with popular social networking sites, such as Facebook and MySpace, or with an operator’s community Web site, so that users can create groups, add friends who are subscribed to the same operator, share their own recommendations with their friends, and view photos from their friends’ profiles on their TV screens. The new Flash user interface, meanwhile, extends Orca’s flagship RiGHTv IPTV middleware and supports a range of interactive services, including VOD, PVR and personalized content recommendations (via COMPASS). Finally, Orca’s new targeted advertising capabilities are based on the personalized services enabled by the COMPASS engine. According to the company, they allow tailored advertising to be delivered via screen overlays, portal banners and regular 30-second spots. “COMPASS introduced to the market a revolutionary platform to provide viewers with the ultimate personalized TV experience,” Orca’s Barel said in a prepared statement. “Based on the success and market demand for this unique technology, we are now taking things a step further with new social networking tools that allow people to automatically receive content recommendations from those whose opinion they value most–their friends, family and social groups. We expect that these innovative applications, combined with targeted advertising features, will serve as a key driver for operator growth by ensuring customer satisfaction and creating new revenue sources.”
• The company has integrated its RiGHTv middleware and its COMPASS content discovery technology with voco, a remote control from Austrian infrared device specialist, Ruwido, that incorporates fingerprint-recognition technology in order to identify individual users in a household and thus personalize their viewing experience. It claims that the integration will provide end-users with “one of the most personalized interactive TV experiences available in the IPTV market” and will enable operators and advertisers to “provide more targeted services to niche audiences that best reflect individual user interests and needs.” According to Orca, when used in conjunction with its IPTV technologies, the voco remote will enable users to create individual TV viewing profiles, facilitating instant access–via the swipe of a finger–to a personalized TV experience comprised of their favorite channels, VOD services, and user interface skins, as well as personalized content recommendations. The company says that the integrated solution also supports secure payment options, and simplifies parental control features (via its support of separate profiles for each member of a family). It also claims that advertisers and operators will be able to use the solution to generate new revenues by being able to offer targeted advertising and other targeted services that leverage the solution’s ability to distinguish between end-users. “As personalization continues to take precedence in the multimedia TV arena, personal recognition technology is representative of the next leap forward in the evolving interactive TV experience,” Sefy Ariely, Orca’s VP of sales and marketing, said in a prepared statement. “As a pioneer in IPTV middleware this advanced functionality complements our content navigation capabilities and also our vision of continuity in the field of innovation.” Added Ruwido managing director, Ferdinand Maier: “voco provides users with the security to effectively distinguish and explore their personal tastes as part of an enriched viewing experience.”