ProSiebenSat.1 selects AWS as primary cloud provider

Wednesday, November 27th, 2019
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ProSiebenSat.1 Using AWS to Transform the Future of Media in Europe

  • Europe’s leading media group chooses AWS as its primary cloud provider to transform its business and accelerate the delivery of new products with AWS machine learning services

SEATTLE — Today, Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com company (NASDAQ: AMZN), announced that ProSiebenSat.1 Media SE, Europe’s leading satellite and cable broadcaster, operating television channels, digital VoD platforms and e-commerce brands, has selected AWS as its primary cloud provider. ProSiebenSat.1 is working closely with AWS to adopt cloud services within all parts of its broadcast and digital media businesses, production companies, and e-commerce platforms. With AWS, ProSiebenSat.1 is improving the time to market of new applications, and introducing advanced analytics and machine learning (ML) technologies across its organization, which is transforming the viewing experience for 45 million households across Germany, Austria, and Switzerland.

ProSiebenSat.1 has a long history of working with AWS because of its deep portfolio of cloud services, high levels of security and compliance, rapid pace of innovation, and proven experience in reliably supporting millions of customers around the world. Most of ProSiebenSat.1‘s brands have deployed applications on AWS, including its Joyn streaming platform, offering viewers over 20,000 episodes and 55 live channels in the cloud. ProSiebenSat.1 also runs the commerce businesses of its NuCom Group, a growing e-commerce player with 10 leading portfolio companies, on AWS as well as the production business of its Red Arrow Studios, one of the world’s leading creators and distributors of entertainment content.

Recently, ProSiebenSat.1 made a corporate-wide decision to integrate AWS ML services into every aspect of its business to automate processes and develop new, personalized products. Adopting AWS ML services will enable ProSiebenSat.1 to more intelligently tailor advertising to viewers and enhance personalization and recommendations across all of its media brands. One of its most strategic projects uses Amazon SageMaker, a fully managed service to build, train, and deploy ML models, and AWS data analytics tools to predict the future value of an upcoming advertising slot.

The solution uses a deep neural network —trained and deployed using Amazon SageMaker – to predict ad conversion rates based on inputs such as the slot time, genre of the TV show, and ad content. As a result, the service is able to predict, weeks in advance, how many impressions an advertisement will generate. This allows advertisers to predict who will watch their ads, helping them to make informed purchasing decisions, while simultaneously enhancing the viewer experience with ads that are more closely aligned with consumer preferences.

“ProSiebenSat.1 is a leading European entertainment conglomerate with a strong commerce business and we continue to drive the ongoing transformation of the Group into a technology-and data-led company with an emphasis on growing our digital and diversified future,” said Nick Thexton, Chief Technology Officer of ProSiebenSat.1. “AWS is a key strategic partner who has consistently driven cloud adoption for over a decade and is still setting the pace on what cloud services can do for media businesses. By moving more of our business to AWS and incorporating AWS’s ML services, we are able to enhance our agile software development practices and derive even more value from our large consumer data platforms.”

“Over the past few years, media companies have been using our unmatched portfolio of cloud services to transform the delivery of content and create more personalized viewing experiences to delight audiences on every platform,” said Andy Isherwood, Managing Director, Amazon Web Services EMEA. “As one of the largest and most well-respected media companies in Europe, it is exciting to see ProSiebenSat.1 embracing AWS ML services, and establishing itself as a leader in what is possible. We look forward to supporting the company on its journey to transform how it serves its customers across its media and e-commerce brands.”