Arris sells whole home and media analysis platforms

Arris has agreed to sell its Whole Home Solution platform to TV technology provider Espial and its Media Analysis Framework platform to video ad firm Watchwith.

Arris’ Whole Home Solution (WHS) is an end-to-end, cloud-hosted video service and the deal includes the platform’s infrastructure, client and server software and a team of development and operations workers, based primarily in Kirkland, Washington.

Espial said it will support current whole home customers spanning the US, Canada and Latin America and will aim to accelerate future roadmaps of the platform.

“WHS expands our solution portfolio with a cloud-hosted video-as-a-service platform that is complementary to and will leverage Espial’s current solutions for next-generation IP video services,” said Espial CEO, Jaison Dolvane.

Arris’ president network and cloud and global services, Bruce McClelland, said that with the deal, Arris will continue to focus its R&D investment on the “greater broadband and video ecosystem”.

“Combining the WHS technology and Arris team with Espial will broaden the capability of the overall organisation and accelerate the pace of innovation. This speed is needed to meet increasing customer and consumer demand,” he said.

Separately, Watchwith has acquired Arris’ Media Analysis Framework (MAF), a cloud-based machine learning and automated metadata generation platform.

With this deal, several key Arris engineers that invented the technology will join the company and open a new Watchwith research and development office in Chicago.

MAF was developed in Arris’ advanced research labs. The technology automatically analyses, tags and describes video at a frame level and has been integrated into Watchwith’s advertising products.

This combined solution is able to automatically determine the optimal timing and location within a TV episode to deliver in-program advertising and tune-in messages.

“Our teams have worked closely together on this shared vision for years. The result is the highly scalable, native digital video advertising solution the TV industry needs to compete with Facebook, YouTube, Snapchat and other native digital video distribution platforms,” said Zane Vella, Watchwith CEO.

Arris’ McClelland said that the MAF team and technology are “highly complementary” with Watchwith, and said that the company’s dedicated focus will accelerate innovation.

“Arris is invested in MAF’s future with Watchwith — both in the short-term to facilitate a successful transition and continuing to support longer-term growth as an investor in the company.”