Award for technical innovations presented in Vienna

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The ORS Group's broadcast-on-demand solution "Nakolos" was named one of the four best innovations at the EBU Technology & Innovation Award 2023. The winner among 23 submitted projects was the BBC with its "5G Private Network" project.

Group picture EBU Award
Johann Mika (le) and Michael Wagenhofer (ri) accepted the honor for Nakolos. Jaime Sanchez Roldan (mi) won the EBU Young Technology Award 2023. Photo: Roman Zach-Kiesling/EBU/ORF

Nakolos nominated for EBU Technology & Innovation Award 2023

Every year, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) recognizes outstanding technical innovations developed by member organizations with the Technology & Innovation Award. This year, ORS' Nakolos solution was nominated for the award and selected as one of four finalists. The award was presented on June 15, 2023, during the EBU Technical Assembly at ORF in Vienna.

"We would like to thank the EBU members for recognizing the impact Nakolos has and will have on the development of the 5G broadcast ecosystem. This technology is a milestone in the evolution of the 5G broadcast ecosystem and enables promising, innovative applications in the UHF band. On the eve of the WRC 2023 in November, we therefore see this technology leap as one of the points that reinforces our stance that there is no good reason to change the status quo in the allocation of the sub-700 MHz band, even in the long term," says ORS CEO Michael Wagenhofer, pleased with the international recognition.

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Video: What's behind the Nakolos innovation?

Convergence of 5G broadcast and broadband with great benefits

Nakolos was initiated by ORS and Bitstem GmbH to support video providers, broadcasters and broadcast network operators in the distribution of content via 5G broadcast. Specifically, products and solutions are being developed to enable seamless switching between Internet streaming and 5G broadcast on users' mobile phones.

The unpredictable number of users simultaneously streaming live content over mobile devices results in a high CDN bandwidth that needs to be reserved for possible peak times. Reserving and holding this bandwidth entails high costs for content and broadcast providers without knowing exactly if and when it will be needed. With Nakolos' broadcast-on-demand solution, high, unpredictable CDN costs are a thing of the past.

Nakolos Project Team
The team behind the Nakolos project: Johann Mika, Sandra Bacher, Klaus Kühnhammer, Fabian Bottesch and Stefan Babel. Photo: ORS

Best quality for every viewer

Nakolos automatically offloads CDN traffic by sending only one stream to all viewers via 5G Broadcast which reduces distribution costs. This is made possible by taking advantage of 5G Broadcast technology. Here, any IP-based stream (DASH, HLS, CMAF, ...) can be received directly on mobile devices using terrestrial high power high tower transmitters over 60 km. It does not matter how many people are watching the stream. Nakolos guarantees the best quality for a large number of viewers.

Nakolos at a glance

  • enables unlimited high-quality content distribution
  • reduces CDN costs for content providers and broadcasters (peaks and overall consumption)
  • decreases the time and cost effort of broadcasters to integrate 5G Broadcast functionalities like seamless switching between 5G Broadcast and broadband in their apps
  • helps consumers reduce their data consumption by using 5G Broadcast
  • supports 5G broadcast as an innovative broadcast technology in the UHF spectrum thus strongly supports future DTT access

More infos about Nakolos