SBS partners with Akamai to provide seamless Web experience to record-breaking online audience
Akamai Technologies, Inc. the leading provider of cloud services for delivering, optimising and securing online content and business applications, today announced that SBS (Special Broadcasting Service), a hybrid-funded Australian public broadcasting radio and television network and official broadcast partner of the 2014 FIFA World Cup, has deployed Akamai’s Media Delivery and Web Experience solutions to deliver an unprecedented amount of online traffic during the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil over the last month.
A long-term partner of Akamai, SBS leveraged Akamai’s Web Experience and streaming capabilities for its www.sbs.com.com.au, http://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand and theworldgame.sbs.com.au websites for the 2014 World Cup. In the lead up to the 2014 FIFA World Cup, SBS enlisted Akamai to provide additional support to manage the predicted increase in demand for its services.
“We expected to see a significant increase in online viewers with the 2014 World Cup and our predictions have not been wrong. To date, SBS has experienced an unprecedented volume of traffic streaming videos from our websites and dedicated application. In a single day of the 2014 World Cup, we had already experienced more than a quarter of our typical monthly video bandwidth delivery figures. It has broken SBS records for any event we have streamed online by 750% percent,” commented Matt Costain, Technical Director, Online at SBS.
The special arrangements put in place specifically for the 2014 FIFA World Cup ensured SBS could handle the increase in traffic volumes. In particular, it provided the ability to offload traffic, as well as access to a dedicated 24/7 event support team, offering an extra layer of assistance to ensure there was 100 percent uptime.
“The experience Akamai has provided so far has been extremely positive. Not only has it ensured a seamless online viewing experience for our users, it has provided a higher quality experience, through faster load and buffer times and higher bitrates for superior quality. Overall the delivery of content to our end user has been flawless,” said Costain.
During the first two weeks of the 2014 FIFA World Cup, SBS recorded peak traffic during Australia’s match against Chile, with 103,000Mbps, which is expected to increase with the grand final.
“We have seen a greater demand for ‘live’ streaming of the 2014 FIFA World Cup as opposed to ‘catch-up’, which typically generates more interest for all other programs and events. Most surprisingly, the Australian matches have been an exception, with a larger volume of viewers watching it on ‘catch up’. Although, this could be due to the fact that most people are watching these games on TV instead of online. It will be interesting to see how the final match plays out,” commented Costain.
“We are pleased SBS has reaped the full benefits our solutions have to offer and been able to deliver reliable, consistently high-quality experiences to its end users” commented David Habben, Chief Media Strategist, APJ at Akamai.
Akamai has been working with more than fifty rights holders worldwide to enable optimal, global video delivery of all sixty-four matches. Globally, the 2014 FIFA World Cup has experienced significant volumes of online traffic. According to data gathered by Akamai, the 2014 FIFA World Cup has established new highs in live sports traffic delivered across its platform, with USA-Belgium’s 5.68Tbps setting a new peak for an individual match so far during the tournament.Comparatively, Australia’s first match against Chile saw 2.0Tbps of traffic, with a large proportion of this traffic attributed to Australian viewers. The highest total traffic peak to date during the 2014 FIFA World Cup was 6.84Tbps, which was reached during the concurrent Portugal vs Ghana and USA vs Germany matches.
For more information about Akamai’s partnership with The 2014 FIFA World Cup’s right holders globally and to track web traffic volumes, please visit http://www.akamai.com/html/ms/akamai-delivers-online-streaming-performance.html
