Viacom Taps Google Cloud for Digital Content Discovery

How Viacom modernized its Intelligent Content Discovery Platform with Google Cloud

Now more than ever, entertainment has become an immersive experience that often transcends cultures, borders, languages and devices—something that Viacom knows well. The media company delivers entertainment content and experiences to billions of people in more than 180 countries every day through award-winning brands like Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, MTV, BET, and Paramount.

As the amount of content available to a global audience has grown exponentially, Viacom has been working to strengthen its targeting capabilities for content delivery across platforms and to better leverage insights to more efficiently serve personalized experiences to audiences wherever they are.

To acquire more content intelligence and workflow efficiency, Viacom has selected Google Cloud to power its Intelligent Content Discovery Platform. The platform comprises Viacom’s media lifecycle from content creation to distribution and ultimately monetization. For example, when new content is produced, Viacom will be able to automatically extract short-form "clips" identifying what’s relevant to a viewer, all to better showcase new content. Through video intelligence APIs, machine learning technologies will detect and automatically flag particular commercials to help create an optimal, personalized viewer experience.

Google Cloud also empowers smarter direct-to-consumer choices, so that Viacom can provide better in-context ads placement and help consumers reach the content they prefer. Google Cloud’s machine learning capabilities provide Viacom with automated content tagging, discovery and intelligence for more than 65 petabytes of content—the equivalent of 2.5 billion Blu-Ray DVDs of material. This makes it easier for Viacom’s internal stakeholders, such as content editors and ad tech teams, to have a deeper understanding of content while also ensuring viewers get access to more of the content they want to see.

Finally, Viacom is taking advantage of Google’s Customer Reliability Engineering (CRE) model. Designed to deepen the partnership between businesses and customers, CRE comprises Google engineers who collaborate closely with a customer’s operations teams to share the reliability responsibilities for critical cloud applications. Collaborating in this way creates a shared ownership between Google Cloud and Viacom to meet the needs of Viacom and their customers.

“We needed a partner who not only has the technical prowess but the dedication and collaboration to help us pivot toward a cloud-first strategy,” said David Kline, Executive Vice President (EVP) and Chief Information & Technology Officer at Viacom. “One of the most important considerations in selecting Google Cloud was its commitment to ongoing learning and training. The team is the perfect combination of people and technology to help us scale, develop applications, and deliver the best experience to our audiences around the world.”

"We are thrilled to help Viacom infuse machine learning intelligence into legacy workflows to help evolve its business in the digital media ecosystem," added John Honeycutt, Vice President (VP), Telecommunications, Media & Entertainment, Google Cloud on the official Google Cloud Blog. Learn more here about Google Cloud’s media and entertainment offerings at https://cloud.google.com.

From Light Reading:

Viacom Taps Google for Video Lifecycle

Viacom tapped Google Cloud for its video lifecycle management, scoring a win for Google Cloud's new telecom and media business boss.

Viacom, which serves up such cable channels as Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, MTV and BET to TV viewers in more than 180 countries, is looking to Google to boost its content targeting across video platforms and increase the personalization of its services, Google says in a blog post scheduled to go live Wednesday, announcing the deal.

Viacom picked Google Cloud for the media company's Intelligent Content Discovery Platform, managing the media lifecycle from content creation to distribution and monetization. For example, Viacom will be able to automatically extract short video clips when content is produced, identify what's relevant to a viewer and better showcase new content. Machine learning will enable the personalization of commercials, Google says.

In addition, Google Cloud's machine learning capability will provide Viacom with automatic content tagging, discovery and intelligence for more than 65 petabytes of content.

Viacom will also use Google Customer Reliability Engineering (CRE) model to enable Google engineers to collaborate closely with Viacom's operations team to share reliability responsibilities for critical cloud applications.

Why this matters

The deal is an early victory for John Honeycutt, who was named to head up Google's telecom, media and entertainment business unit in February. Prior to joining Google, Honeycutt spent 15 years at Discovery, where he led the migration of operations to the public cloud, including video lifecycle and rolling out mobile OTT platforms -- exactly the kind of thing he's now doing at Google.

In a keynote speech at the NAB Show in Las Vegas on Tuesday, Honeycuttt listed Viacom as "another key media partner" for Google Cloud, along with CBS, the sports OTT video service Fubo and the NBA's Golden State Warriors. He said he sees "a lot of opportunities" for leveraging AI and machine learning to aid various industries, including media, gaming, sports and health care.

Thomas Kurian took over as CEO of Google Cloud in January, replacing Diane Greene. Kurian plans to shift the platform's focus from "digital native" companies -- large startups that began in the cloud -- to established vertical industries, he told the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference in February. Viacom fits that strategy; it's no cloud native.

The focus on vertical industries is similar to Oracle's strategy, which is no coincidence; Kurian is a longtime Oracle veteran. Oracle has whole business units devoted to individual industries, and those business units know their industries in depth.

In a blog post Tuesday kicking off the Google Next partner and customer conference, Kurian identified six key industries, namely healthcare, financial services, media and entertainment, retail, manufacturing and industrial, and public sector and education.

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From Media & Entertainment Services Alliance:

NAB 2019: Google Cloud Makes AI Deployment Easier, Partners with Viacom
LAS VEGAS — Google Cloud announced both new partnerships and new tech advances at the NAB Show, with Viacom looking to Google to automated content tagging, discovery and intelligence for more than 65 petabytes of content.

“To acquire more content intelligence and workflow efficiency, Viacom selected Google Cloud to power its Intelligent Content Discovery Platform. The platform comprises Viacom’s media lifecycle from content creation to distribution and ultimately monetization,” said John Honeycutt, VP of telecommunications, media and entertainment for Google Cloud.

“For example, when new content is produced, Viacom will be able to automatically extract short-form ‘clips’ identifying what’s relevant to a viewer, all to better showcase new content. Through video intelligence APIs, machine learning technologies will detect and automatically flag particular commercials to help create an optimal, personalized viewer experience.”

Google Cloud is also helping Viacom provide better in-context ads placement and its machine learning capabilities are allowing the media giant’s content editors and ad tech teams to have a better understanding of content.

Viacom is also taking advantage of Google’s Customer Reliability Engineering (CRE) model, comprised of a team of Google engineers who collaborate with a customer’s operations teams to share reliability responsibilities for critical cloud applications.

“We needed a partner who not only has the technical prowess but the dedication and collaboration to help us pivot toward a cloud-first strategy,” said David Kline, EVP and chief information and technology officer for Viacom. “One of the most important considerations in selecting Google Cloud was its commitment to ongoing learning and training. The team is the perfect combination of people and technology to help us scale, develop applications, and deliver the best experience to our audiences around the world.”

Google Cloud also announced it is expanding its platform to make it easier to build and deploy AI, with the launch of AutoML Video, allowing developers to can easily create custom models that automatically classify video content with labels they define.

“Companies that deal with mountains of diverse video data can instantly discover content according to their own taxonomy,” said Rajen Sheth, director of product management for Google Cloud. “This means media and entertainment businesses can simplify tasks like automatically removing commercials or creating highlight reels, and other industries can apply it to their own specific video analysis needs—for example, better understanding traffic patterns or overseeing manufacturing processes.

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From CSI:

Google Cloud steps up M&E focus with Viacom win

Google’s John Honeycutt is already bringing new media business. Viacom has selected Google Cloud for its video lifecycle management and to enhance its content discovery capabilities.

In February we argued that Honeycutt’s experience of migrating Discovery Communications functions like playout into the cloud will pay off to steer Google’s cloud direction, especially for media & entertainment customers (see http://www.csimagazine.com/csi/Will-Honeycutt-step-up-Google-ME-efforts-in-the-cloud.php). Honeycutt now leads Google's telecom, media and entertainment business unit after 15 years at Discover, where he was most recently CTO.

Google’s other media customers include CBS and OTT service Fubo, but the company trails behind rivals Microsoft Azure and especially AWS in this space. Thomas Kurian, who took over as CEO of the entire Google Cloud business in January, has the remit of increasing enterprise and businesses penetration. Media & entertainment is among the six verticals highlighted by Kurian as being the focus of Google’s cloud efforts. The others include healthcare, financial services, retail, manufacturing and industrial, and public sector and education.

For Viacom, the programmer has turned to Google Cloud as it continues to expand its direct-to-consumer streaming video strategy. Viacom is using Google Cloud for its Intelligent Content Discovery Platform, which uses machine learning to automatically pull short clips from content as soon as it is ingested into the platform. It can highlight new content or segments, or identify commercials to optimise the viewing experience. Machine learning will enable the personalisation of commercials, according to Google.

Google Cloud's machine learning capability will provide Viacom with automatic content tagging, discovery and intelligence for more than 65 petabytes of content. This will allow Viacom to easily locate and understand the context of the content, while improving the efficiency of distribution strategies to consumers.

Viacom will also use Google Customer Reliability Engineering (CRE) model to enable Google engineers to collaborate closely with Viacom's operations team to share reliability responsibilities for critical cloud applications.

Viacom serves cable channels as Nickelodeon, Comedy Central, MTV and BET to TV viewers in more than 180 countries. It has also created and launched a number of digital studios to produce original content for streaming services, like Netflix and Hulu, as well as social-media platforms, such as Facebook and Snapchat, and Viacom’s own digital platforms. Pluto TV, an ad-supported (AVOD) streaming service is also owned by Viacom.

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From MediaPost:

Viacom Taps Google Cloud For Digital Content Discovery

As Viacom continues to expand its direct-to-consumer streaming video strategy, the company is turning to Google Cloud to enhance its content discovery capabilities.

Viacom, like many of its media competitors, is creating more content every year, increasingly for a global audience that may consume it on different platforms.

The company is using Google Cloud for its "Intelligent Content Discovery Platform.” The platform uses machine learning to automatically pull short clips from content as soon as it is ingested into the platform. It can highlight new content or segments, or identify commercials to optimize the viewing experience.

The company is using Google Cloud for automated content tagging, discovery and intelligence. Encompassing some 65 petabytes of content, the deal allows Viacom’s own teams to easily locate and understand the context of the content, while improving the efficiency of distribution strategies to consumers.

Viacom is also embracing Google’s Customer Reliability Engineering (CRE) strategy, collaborating closely with Google engineers to develop and maintain applications.

The ability of Google Cloud’s solutions to scale across platforms and around the globe is seen as an asset.

While companies like Disney and WarnerMedia are betting on their own premium direct-to-consumer offerings, Viacom has taken a multi-pronged approach to digital content.

The company has created and launched a number of digital studios to produce original content for streaming services, like Netflix and Hulu, as well as social-media platforms, such as Facebook and Snapchat, an Viacom’s own digital platforms.

At the same time, the company acquired Pluto TV to have a free, ad-supported streaming offering for consumers. Pluto TV has a rotating library of free programming, including from Viacom’s own stable of channels.

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From FierceVideo:

Google Cloud democratizes machine learning access with AutoML Video

LAS VEGAS—Bringing together the staff, resources and expertise necessary to apply machine learning models toward analyzing video content libraries isn’t so easy for all media companies. But Google Cloud may have leveled the playing field a bit.

The company today announced AutoML Video, a new machine learning feature within its Cloud AutoML product that launched in January 2018. AutoML Video, which is still in beta, allows Google Cloud users to customize models that automatically classify video content with self-defined labels. It’s designed for media and entertainment businesses looking to simplify tasks like automatically removing commercials or creating highlight reels. It can be used in other verticals as well for video analysis geared toward tracking traffic patterns or overseeing manufacturing processes.

Google offers a pair of artificial intelligence products for analyzing video libraries.

AutoML Video Intelligence has a graphical interface for training video classification models. It’s built for projects that need custom labels which aren’t covered by the pre-trained Video Intelligence API.

The Video Intelligence API has pre-trained machine learning models that automatically recognize objects, places, and actions in stored and streaming video.

At the NAB Show, Google Cloud also announced that it’s working with Viacom to apply its machine learning capabilities to Viacom’s content creation and distribution workflow. Google will help Viacom automate production of short-form clips identifying what’s relevant to a viewer, serve more contextual ads on direct-to-consumer platforms and automate content tagging, discovery and intelligence for more than 65 petabytes of content.

John Honeycutt, head of telecommunications, media and entertainment for Google Cloud, said the set of tools his company is offering in the cloud are about taking friction out of the supply chain and creating speed, transparency and efficiency.

“All of this data will flow much faster because we’ve taken all the gates out of the process,” Honeycutt said.

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About Viacom

Viacom creates entertainment experiences that drive conversation and culture around the world. Through television, film, digital media, live events, merchandise and solutions, our brands connect with diverse, young and young at heart audiences in more than 180 countries.

For more information on Viacom and its businesses, visit www.viacom.com. Keep up with Viacom news by following us on Twitter (twitter.com/viacom), Facebook (facebook.com/viacom) and LinkedIn (linkedin.com/company/viacom).

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