HÀ NỘI — VTV Digital, the operator of VTVgo, streamed high-definition coverage of a major international sports tournament to more than 22 million viewers across Việt Nam using cloud infrastructure from Amazon Web Services (AWS), the company said.

The broadcaster said the AWS-based system helped it handle sharp increases in traffic during the tournament while maintaining streaming services for viewers nationwide.

VTV Digital introduced 1080p full-HD streaming for paid subscribers, alongside video-on-demand content, match and player highlights, and four audio options: Northern Vietnamese, Southern Vietnamese, the original broadcast feed and English commentary. Free-tier users continued to have access to streams of up to 720p.

The new service attracted more than 600,000 net-new subscriptions during the tournament, according to VTV Digital.

At peak periods, the system handled more than 704,000 requests per second and delivered about 1.41Tbps of bandwidth. On the busiest day, VTVgo delivered more than 5.7 petabytes of content, about 533 times its average daily traffic.

Amazon CloudFront accounted for up to 70 per cent of VTV Digital's streaming traffic during the tournament. The content delivery network uses servers located within the networks of four major Vietnamese internet service providers to distribute content closer to users.

VTV Digital used AWS services across its streaming workflow. Live broadcast feeds were encoded at VTV's facilities using AWS Elemental MediaLive Anywhere before being transported to the cloud through AWS Elemental MediaConnect using the Secure Reliable Transport protocol.

AWS Elemental MediaLive then converted the feeds into different video qualities to accommodate different devices and network conditions, while AWS Elemental MediaPackage prepared the content for HLS streaming. Amazon CloudFront handled content delivery, while AWS WAF was used to protect the service and restrict access outside Việt Nam.

Phạm Anh Chiến, Director of VTV Digital, said the platform had focused on improving streaming quality and giving viewers more options for following live sports.

The infrastructure was subsequently used to stream the ASEAN Championship (AFF Cup), with VTV Digital planning to apply the same cloud-based system to additional live channels and content.

The company said it would continue expanding cloud infrastructure for live and on-demand programming, including sports, news and entertainment.

Eric Yeo, Country General Manager for AWS Vietnam, said the VTV Digital case demonstrated the ability of cloud infrastructure to scale during major live events.

VTVgo is VTV Digital's national over-the-top (OTT) platform, providing live and on-demand television content to viewers in Việt Nam. — VNS