About The Switch
Founded in 1991 and headquartered in New York, live video production and delivery experts, The Switch has been connecting viewers around the world to live events for almost three decades, bringing them the content they want across linear TV, on-demand and streaming platforms – on multiple screens and devices. Its live content services are trusted every day by corporate enterprises, tech giants, major broadcasters, and leading sports, esports, news, entertainment, house of worship, and government organizations who rely on The Switch to turn-on their live content. The Switch brings content to wherever viewers are and to whatever device they are using whether it be for linear TV, on-demand streaming, and OTT platforms.
The Switch offers its customers a comprehensive production platform combining mobile and at-home services with the provision of highly skilled production personnel to empower its customers to efficiently capture, edit, and package compelling live coverage. The Switch global transmission network connects 800+ of the world’s largest content producers, distributors, and sports and event venues – seamlessly linking rights holders, broadcasters, streaming platforms, media outlets, and web services.
“First and foremost, we love the Makito’s ease of use. Secondly, not only is the quality of the product excellent, but the technical support and response times have been some of the best I’ve ever seen.”
Ken Stiver
Senior Director, Engineering & Field Operations, The Switch
The Challenge
An Accelerated Transition to IP-Based Workflows
Although as an organization the Switch is predominantly known for live sports, during the pandemic the company saw a big uptick in the way that enterprise customers are conducting their businesses to plug the gap created by travel restrictions for corporate communications and events for example.
Both its enterprise and broadcast customers are far more willing to experiment with remote IP-based workflows as they simply don’t have a choice anymore.
“The broadcast industry was certainly already headed this route, but the pandemic has accelerated the transition to IP-based workflows.”
The Solution
Low Latency, Reliability, and Security
The Switch is using Haivision Makito X video encoders and decoders for several ongoing customer projects for live sports viewing and betting as well as for esports. For all these use cases, low latency and reliability are critical which is why Haivision solutions have been deployed as in some cases, systems are running 24/7.
The Makito X platform was selected because of its native support for the Secure Reliable Transport (SRT) protocol which provides both excellent packet loss recovery and the security that its clients demand to protect their valuable content. The lightweight compact form factor is also a plus factor as Makitos are used in the company’s flypacks.
The Result
The Haivision professional services team provided a three-day online training seminar covering everything from a product overview, IP workflows, configuration, best practices, and troubleshooting to the whole of the Switch team and the feedback was extremely positive.
“At the Switch, we believe in keeping our vendor count as low as possible so that our team can be true experts in fewer devices, this is key to setting ourselves up for success.”
