Media services provider Encompass Digital Media sees accelerated consolidation in its industry as companies without a worldwide presence are sold off to bigger enterprises, Encompass President William Tillson said.
“The consolidation will continue especially in the regional companies without a global footprint,” Tillson said. “I don’t think you can be in this business without” a global presence with both fiber and satellite access.
Los Angeles-based Encompass operates eight teleports in the United States, London and Singapore and processes more than 20,000 hours per day of programming. In addition to commercial customers, Encompass has carved out a niche business in beaming government services videos for the U.S. Department of Defense.
Tillson said a growing area of interest for Encompass is disaster response, when mobile units with high-definition equipment, voice-over-IP and data capability needed to be carried into a remote site all in a 15-kilogram package.
Unmanned aircraft, he said, “is probably the biggest growth area. The quantity of data is growing and enormous. You make your greatest cost savings by reducing the number of human beings on site and replacing people with drone technology.”
Echoing remarks made by other satellite service providers, Tillson said the issue of satellite capacity in certain regions raises the issue of these companies’ relations to satellite operators: “Are these friends or foes?” he asked.
