Red Bee doubles OTT customer base and delivers rapid growth
Red Bee Media has more than doubled its client base as organisations increasingly realise the benefits of streaming media services to reach fans, consumers and audiences everywhere.
Red Bee has decades of experience in managed media services and its cloud-based platforms offer customers support across the entire content delivery chain. This is complemented by the company’s content enrichment offering, in the form of accessibility services (captions, signing and audio description) and content discovery (metadata).
“Companies always look for new ways to improve their relationships with end users,” said Steve Russell, chief product officer, Red Bee. “Traditionally, there has been a bridge separating content and the audience watching it, preventing truly tactile, two-way user experiences. This keeps audiences at arm’s length. Direct streaming services shorten that distance and bring the fan and the content owner closer. We’re opening the door to an array of new business opportunities for our customers and building potentially lifelong audience loyalties.”
“Our modern software architecture is fully cloud and microservices based, which enables us to launch new features and evolve faster than anyone else in the market,” said Anders Wassén, head OTT development, Red Bee “It is a huge competitive advantage and something that all customers highly appreciate, including traditional broadcasters, niche content owners and new media businesses.”
Red Bee’s growth mirrors the broader trend of surging online viewing and content streaming over the past several years.
According to Statista, OTT media revenue worldwide is expected to reach more than $210 billion by 2026, almost double the $106 billion generated in 2020. This volume, accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, has also been steadily driven by new network bandwidth technologies like 5G, continually improving home entertainment systems and more consumers cutting the cord to rely solely on the internet for content viewing.
“Every brand has an audience to reach and a story to tell and live-streaming can deliver a message in a personalised, engaging voice,” added Russell.
Recent customer launches on the Red Bee platform include Extreme E and Fightzone. For the all-electric racing series, Red Bee handles global satellite distribution for linear broadcasters, as well as the digital distribution and streaming for its website and rights-holders across the world. For Fightzone it delivers a worldwide streaming service dedicated to British and international boxing, where global audiences gain access to over 50 live events per year, in broadcast quality directly delivered to their preferred device through pay-per-view and subscription-based options.
Red Bee plans to continue blending its core expertise with new services to meet the growing demand for video-on-demand and live streaming in established and emerging markets.
“This is a pivotal time for brands to re-engage with fans in entirely new ways not possible with traditional methods,” said Steve Nylund, CEO, Red Bee. “By owning and investing in their content, brands can control their narrative and brand experience. Streaming is not going away. Within a live event, the audience is as much a part of the entertainment as the artist. A unique relationship is formed by those special little memories when a kid ran up on stage, or there was a fan marriage proposal or whatever else happens in the moment. Streaming can intimately translate that spontaneity to the online viewer and preserve it so everyone remembers it. That’s a powerful and lasting connection.”