Digital Fountain aims to smooth the media stream

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By Elinor Abreu

(IDG) -- Jerky Webcasts have been a disappointment for everyone from concerned Cisco shareholders logging on in February to learn about the company's second-quarter earnings reports to Victoria's Secret catalog fans, 2 million of whom logged on last May to check out the lingerie maker's summer runway show. But a new streaming media server announced Monday could make Webcasts a thing of the past.

Fremont, Calif.-based Digital Fountain has developed a unique technology that solves the "content brown-out" that occurs when too many people are trying to access the same content simultaneously. The company's Streaming Fountain server and Download Fountain Player are designed to distribute content such as movies, software downloads, and image and music files on behalf of Web sites and companies trying to reach a large audience.

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Existing streaming-media technologies transmit raw data that must be received by the end computer in the exact order it was sent in order to avoid the fuzzy, choppy images and sound typical of today's Webcasts. But Digital Fountain's new technology streams mathematical equations that can be delivered in any order. Since each packet of so-called Meta-Content contains data about the entire file being transmitted, the end computer only needs to receive a sufficient number of packets in order to perfectly re-create the original content.

Such technology will allow companies that offer live Webcasts and video-on-demand services to broadcast content to multiple users simultaneously using a single bandwidth stream (a concept known as "multicasting") instead of having to dedicate a bandwidth stream to each end user (called "unicasting"). This will save content providers money that otherwise would be used to buy multiple servers, said Clifford Meltzer, president and CEO of Digital Fountain.

Digital Fountain's technology is 30 times more efficient for unicast networks in which each user gets a dedicated stream of bandwidth and even more efficient for multicast networks where the audience that shares the stream can be unlimited, the company said.

Several companies already are clamoring to use Digital Fountain's technology, and none other than Microsoft has endorsed the company's product. Sony, which invested $1.5 million in Digital Fountain in 1999, is using the technology for video-on-demand internally and is looking to integrate the technology into its business. Another strategic investor, Cisco, will use the technology in its Content Delivery Network system, which will launch in May.

In addition, Nomura Research Institute, based in Tokyo, announced Monday that it will integrate the Digital Fountain technology into the software it offers, called Aqualink, which enables companies to distribute content to corporate intranets via satellite. NRI also is working on a government project that aims to put global positioning systems on top of buses so that they can receive traffic information and other data in real time. With Digital Fountain technology, those transmissions can be received uninterrupted even if the line of sight is impeded by tall buildings, said Tom Misaki, a manager at NRI.

Although the streaming media market hasn't taken off quite yet, it is poised to boom. The global market for streaming media content is projected to grow to $2.5 billion in 2004 from $78 million last year, according to Jupiter Communications.

Bringing down the cost of content delivery will help the market grow. "I don't think there's a lot of demand [for broadcast streaming media] in the business-to-consumer space, but there is for business-to-business," said Michael Hoch, an analyst at market research firm Aberdeen.

B-to-b applications for streaming-media technology include distance learning, sales force training and internal presentations by a company's executives. "[Digital Fountain's technology] changes [streaming capabilities] to on-demand so you can make the Webcast available at 9 a.m. on Monday, and employees can watch it when they are ready," Hoch said, noting that this ability in particular likely will give Digital Fountain a leg up on RealNetworks, the current leader in the streaming-media space.

Digital Fountain, which has been in business since February 1998, has raised $27.5 million to date. Matrix Capital led a $20 million round of financing for the company in September and Granite Ventures, formerly H&Q Venture Associates, led a previous round. In addition to Sony and Cisco, Adobe and Texas Instruments also are strategic investors in the company.

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Video still a challenge for the Web
(PCWorld.com)
Jupiter projects streaming-media boom
(IDG.net)
Cisco eyes emerging markets
(InfoWorld.com)
MS releases new media players
(IDG.net)
Rally 'round live events
(Publish.com)
IBM gets real with media
(InfoWorld.com)
Methods differ for boosting video
(Network World Fusion)
Intel scraps streaming media
(Publish.com)

Digital Fountain
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