By Shaun Lim
“Artificial intelligence (AI) is poised to transform Asia’s broadcast and media industry by increasing efficiency, enhancing content quality, providing deeper audience insights, and driving revenue growth through personalised and targeted advertising.”
The above analysis, while provided by the now ubiquitously utilised ChatGPT, may be nearer to the truth than many generative chatbox naysayers would give the technology credit for. According to Grand View Research, the global AI in media & entertainment market size is expected to reach USD$99.48 billion by 2030, expanding at a CAGR of 26.9% from 2022 to 2030.
While projected figures vary (even ChatGPT does not have a definitive answer to that), the AI in media & entertainment market in Asia was valued at approximately US$1 billion in 2020 and is expected to reach US$5 billion by 2026.
Representing just a fraction of the overall market share, this nevertheless represents a growing market sector, and it would appear that some broadcasters in the Asia-Pacific region are not sitting around to find out what AI can do for them.
Last year, Indonesian free-to-air (FTA) broadcaster tvOne introduced Nadira, the country’s first AI news presenter, created in the image of regular (and human) newscaster Fahada Indi. “With this AI technology, I can read the news anywhere, then my avatar appears,” Indi stated with a smile.
You might be surprised, or not, that Nadira has many AI peers operating in broadcast stations throughout Asia. India Today Group’s counts among its ranks AI-powered anchor Sana, while Taiwan’s FTV has an unnamed yet inexplicably attractive female AI weather presenter.
In Southeast Asia, the leveraging of AI by broadcasters to streamline operations has also begun, albeit on a less visually captivating scale.
Singapore’s Mediacorp recently won a silver award for Best Use of AI in the Newsroom at the World Association of News Publishers (WAN-IFRA) Digital Media Awards Asia 2024.
Mediacorp’s AI SmartCut solution uses voice recognition and natural language processing to automatically generate news clips from its CNA’s prime-time news bulletins. This means news video packages, live reports and interviews can be uploaded to CNA’s website, TV app and YouTube channel within minutes of going on air.
Walter Fernandez, Mediacorp’s Editor-in-Chief, said, “Our use of AI to reinvent our approach to television news and to quickly generate bulletin highlights for swift distribution across various platforms is one of our many initiatives to respond to evolving audience consumption patterns and needs.”
Next step — embrace AI for enhanced content creation
For others, such as Thailand’s Next Step Company (NSC), the AI journey has only just begun with infinite possibilities on the horizon.
Amornphat Chomrat, Managing Director, Next Step Company (NSC), told APB+, “NSC is taking our first steps into the exciting world of AI. We’re currently using it to streamline workflows like scripting and translation.
“These AI tools are helping us identify and reduce repetitive tasks, freeing up our talented staff to focus on more creative endeavours.”
Established in 1988, NSC reaches about 20 million viewers in Thailand, including via the Good TV direct-to-home (DTH) satellite platform, whose mission is to improve the wellbeing and equality of the Thai people by providing a wide variety of segmented content.
This is why Good TV is constantly exploring innovative solutions to deliver exceptional content to their viewers, a goal that AI is helping to achieve by first and foremost, empowering its people.
“A great example is content translation, which has always been a bottleneck for us, especially for our Thainess Global channel. AI helps translate Thai to English, which allows us to quickly get content into a good starting point,” said Chomrat.
“Our staff can then focus on the final polish and ensure the content is culturally appropriate for viewers. This is crucial for Thainess, our international channel that broadcasts Thai food, travel, and culture 24/7 … AI helps us translate content efficiently so we can share the wonders of Thailand with a global audience.”
Other possibilities that AI is offering Good TV include script writing, improving advertising copywriting, as well as creating more concise synopsis from transcripts at a faster rate.
“Furthermore, AI can streamline content production workflows across all broadcasting operations, allowing us to optimise costs while maintaining our high production standards,” Chomrat added.
While excited about the future possibilities that AI can offer, he is quick to acknowledge that the relatively new technology brings about concerns such as originality and copyright issues. The onus, he added, is on broadcasters to use AI responsibly and ethically, which Good TV is committed to do.
“The potential of AI in broadcasting is undeniable, and we’re already seeing AI news anchors and live transcriptions. We’re also using AI analytics to better understand viewers and tailor our programming and marketing accordingly.
“We’re excited about the possibilities AI holds for the future of broadcasting, not just in APAC, but globally. We believe AI can be a powerful tool to enhance storytelling and connect with audiences in new ways,” Chomrat stated.
New verification paradigm for sports broadcasting
With monetisation keeping many broadcasters up at night in recent years, AI can be a potential game changer in the area of ad monetisation, particularly in the increasingly popular realm of sports streaming.
Nitin Jian, Managing Partner, Business & Solution Engineering, Skandha Media Services, shared with APB+, “Ensuring transparency in ad delivery is crucial for both broadcasters and advertisers. Broadcasters play a vital role in connecting audiences with brands, and advertisers, who spend big money on ad insertions during live sports broadcasts, need to be certain their campaigns reach the intended viewers and are displayed correctly.
“For live sports streams that may be firing hundreds and even thousands of ads over the full length of a live game or competition, providing consistent and accurate data has been challenging. This is why we started tapping into AI — to provide easily accessible visual proof of delivery — and it’s changing the game for both broadcasters and advertisers.”
Specifically, Skandha Media Services launched Evince, its AI ad verification tool designed to ensure fair competition for broadcasters and foster trust with advertisers.
Evince captures all the impressions for video ads, L-bands, Aston, ticker and logos and goes far beyond providing traditional logs. It gives ad agencies the ability to check that every ad not only appears visually correctly on a specific stream or platform, but also at the allocated time, in a particular spot, and for the expected duration.
“Ultimately, Evince ensures that contractual obligations are met, providing advertisers with automated visual proof-of-delivery and billed on actual impressions fired during the events without any mismatch of data,” Nitin explained.
By capturing ad elements on live sports streams, AI platforms such as Evince also open more windows of opportunity for broadcasters to create more immersive viewing experiences.
Leveraging Evince, broadcasters can gain access to more data on the type of ads that have been played and can analyse the relevance of these ads on specific spots and investigate various AI algorithms to provide a better user experience, in turn filling more relevant ads in the future.
Nitin added, “By leveraging AI technologies, broadcasters not only can enhance the quality and efficiency of ads in sports broadcasting but also create more engaging and personalised experiences for viewers worldwide.
“As AI continues to evolve, its impact on sports broadcasting is expected to grow, offering broadcasters new opportunities to innovate and differentiate their content offerings.”
Like NSC’s Chomrat, Nitin is convinced that it is evitable that AI will continue to transform broadcast, bringing with it new waves of change.
Where Skandha is concerned, the company is continuing to improve on its roadmap of products and services to provide revenue opportunities for more broadcasters. This includes working on various AI-based technology models to extract the most relevant spots for ads within the content.
This, said Nitin, involves consuming services like transcription and translation to identify optimal ad spots. “We are also focusing on identifying accurate spots for contextual ads to help broadcasters and over-the-top (OTT) providers generate more revenue.
“We’re also exploring the areas of audience insights and analytics whereby AI can analyse viewer data to recommend content, tailor ad placements, and personalise the viewing experience. This could lead to more engaging broadcasts and increased ad revenue.”
With careful consideration of what AI can, or should not do, it would appear that the possibilities offered by AI to transform the broadcast and media industry would definitely grow as a key enabler to further enhance business and empower people.
AI is rising and rising … embrace it and watch your revenue grow!