Yospace is celebrating its 25th anniversary, a period of time that has seen huge transformation in digital video. We’re marking the milestone by asking some of our valued partners about their own journeys in digital video and what they think the priorities are moving forward. This week we’re speaking with Frank Heineberg, who is VP Standards and Innovations at RTL Technology.

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Can you tell us a bit about who you are and what you do?

My name is Frank Heineberg. I work for RTL Technology, the technology provider of RTL Deutschland, as VP Standards and Innovations.

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I manage innovation projects at RTL and represent our organisation in various standardisation bodies like HbbTV and DVB. One topic I'm very involved in is the implementation of addressable TV on our linear services where we use server side and client-side dynamic ad insertion (DAI) technologies.

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Can you tell us a bit about your own journey in the digital video industry?

I've been with RTL for almost 34 years. I started out as an audio/video systems engineer and was involved in the maintenance and integration of broadcasting technology; at that time, analogue Betacam tape machines were the state of the art in video recording equipment!

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But in the 90s, the transition to digital technology progressed rapidly.  Later in my career, I managed the broadcast system engineering department before I started working in TV Distribution 10 years ago. This is a very exciting field of work as the intervals between technical innovations are getting faster and faster and the variety of services is increasing; while RTL started 40 years ago with just one broadcast channel, today RTL Deutschland provides a huge portfolio of digital media, via broadcast, streaming, radio, digital and print.

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How important is viewer experience when it comes to advertising?

It is very important; the expectation is of course that the advertising is technically of high quality, e.g. in terms of seamless switching between PGM and Ads, no issues like buffering etc.  And targeted ads of personal interest can also help to satisfy the viewer, same as frequency capping of ads.

To avoid viewer frustration and achieve a high level of compatibility with users' devices, the technical ad distribution infrastructure must be highly reliable and future proof.

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TV advertising is at a pivot point as more and more viewers move online. What do you think is working well? What needs to be improved?

Technically it already works quite well, so that addressable TV advertising in various forms is daily business for RTL and our competitors. What still can be improved from the engineering viewpoint is, e.g. the implementation of open standards like HbbTV-TA (client side), technical compatibility in combination with DASH streams & encoding, scalability and pre-announcement of load/traffic, and ad-server handling with regards to many requests at the same time in the same environment. 

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As an extension to that question, what do you think the biggest priorities will be for ad-funded broadcasters over the next few years?

Although linear television is still alive and well, the challenge is to maintain our Broadcast reach, while expanding Streaming reach at the same time. This goes hand in hand with the linking of linear TV advertising with addressable advertising technologies over IP. And we have entered a world where we are competing with the US giants in terms of ad technology/revenue and content. Therefore, we are continuously working on new and flexible models for ad distribution in hybrid marketing approaches, with a clear focus on addressable reach on big screens.  

We need smart technologies and good partners to create these transitions.

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RTL is a long-standing partner of Yospace. What does the relationship mean to you?

I would say we are not only partners, but colleagues in between the RTL Group; it has been a very trustful cooperation over the years; We solve solve problems together in motivated teams and have a common vision; we always can rely on the great support from Yospace, and their expertise in server-side ad substitution is highly appreciated - congratulations on the 25th anniversary!