Enterprise software vendor Microsoft said it will be supplying cloud encoding and hosting platform for NBC Olympics, a division of the NBC Sports Group, during its production of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, Feb. 6–23.
As a result, viewers will be able to watch Winter Olympics programming via more than 50 live high-definition streams and on demand.
Microsoft in a statement said NBC will use Windows Azure Media Services, a video service platform hosted in Microsoft’s data centers, to publish and stream coverage of the 2014 Sochi Winter Games. Global viewers can access live and on-demand content via the NBC Sports Live Extra app available free on Windows 8 and Windows RT devices, Windows Phone, Android, and iOS.
In addition, viewers can go to NBCOlympics dot com to view live or on-demand Olympics events on a PC or Mac — all being streamed with support from Windows Azure Media Services.
Microsoft customers watching the Winter Olympics will benefit from a connected viewing experience across any Windows Phone 8 or Windows 8, Windows RT, Windows 8.1 or Windows RT 8.1 device.
To deliver NBC Olympics on-demand and live streaming coverage of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games, Microsoft is working with Adobe Systems and its Primetime TV publishing and monetization platform, including Adobe Primetime Player SDKs for Android, iOS, Windows, Mac OS and other platforms.
Microsoft is also working with iStreamPlanet and its cloud-based, live video workflow solution Aventus to power live video ingest and multiple bit rate encoding, including ad insertion, for NBC’s streaming coverage of the Olympic Games.
