QVC launch interactive beauty channel
QVC launch the Beauty Channel - the first television channel in the UK dedicated to beauty programming. Storage architecture supplied by Pharos.
QVC announced the launch of the Beauty Channel - the first television channel in the UK dedicated to beauty programming. The Beauty Channel has launched on the next generation multi-screen application developed for QVC Active on QVC channel 640 on the Sky platform. Multiple partners have been involved including Ensequence, the interactive TV company, PubliTronic, TX2, and Isilon, all working with QVC's in-house interactive TV team.
QVC UK partnered with Ensequence to completely redesign and rebuild the QVC UK interactive television shopping experience on Sky Digital. In addition, the Ensequence Professional Services team in the UK managed the deployment and integration with QVC's transactional, fulfillment and content management systems.
Using Ensequence technology, QVC UK is able to promote a wide range of interactive product browsing options for their viewers and to change the featured products each day. The interactive TV shopping experience allows viewers to use their Sky remote control to choose between four separate video channels and easily purchase on-air products from each one.
"We're excited to be working with QVC UK to enable the most advanced interactive television shopping channel in the world," said Dalen Harrison, Ensequence CEO. "With interactive television, QVC UK is increasing viewer engagement and making it simple for viewers to purchase products directly from their television using their remote control."
QVC Active offers a multi-screen service of four video streams: the live television output; QVC + 1 hour; the Today's Special Value video; and the dedicated Beauty Channel, showcasing QVC's beauty range, giving customers more choices in how they view and buy. Every channel is supported by real-time product tracking information.
The Beauty Channel is played out and managed by a specialist broadcast planning, asset management and transmission system which was developed in partnership with PubliTronic UK,, using their server and customised Cobalt control software. The system automatically segments and stores the beauty products aired by QVC to an Isilon iQ storage cluster provided by Pharos UK and allows QVC's planning department to select appropriate beauty videos for transmission. Only those products that are in stock are available for the transmission play-lists as the whole system is fully integrated with QVC's real-time business systems. Product sell-outs are also automatically handled by either removing the clips from play-lists or by real time generation of on-air sell out graphics. The Isilon iQ storage system will hold a library of six months of QVC's beauty clips. Initially the Beauty Channel will offer four hours of looped videos.
"These are exciting times for QVC viewers on Sky," commented Paul Murphy, Head of Media Technology, QVC UK. "Ensequence software and services have provided us with the capability to enhance and develop our own on-air interactive applications, and PubliTronic has provided us with our first end-to-end tapeless workflow and transmission system. Combined with Isilon's iQ storage provided by Pharos, we now have a robust and flexible way of allowing our customers to make considered purchases of beauty products from the wealth of broadcast-quality videos that we have available. This a genuine example of partnership, with everyone, including our own media technology team, working together to deliver a complicated integration project which gives our customers a faster, richer and better-designed service with more choice of products every day."
read more about Pharos' technology partner Publitronic
Published on 5 Nov 2008