A Business' Roadmap for Accelerating the Customer Experience in 2019

Jaheer Abbas, Senior Sales Director, SEA and India, Limelight Networks

Jaheer Abbas, Senior Sales Director, SEA and India, Limelight Networks

2018 has truly been a year of shakeups and transformation in the technology space – from incidents of serious data breaches, to the acceleration of advanced technology adoption through machine learning and artificial intelligence.

As we prepare for the year ahead, businesses need to relook their technology tool kit, and determine how they can best prepare themselves to stay ahead of disruption even as it happens at an accelerated pace in the new year, and more importantly, retain and grow their customer base.

It is imperative to recognise that the customer experience is integral to all business success and thus, should be the driving force of all technological implementations.

Ahead of the new year, we spotlight three key technology trends that will accelerate the customer experience in 2019, and improve their affinity with brands and businesses:

The integration of emerging technologies in Content Delivery Networks (CDNs)

With the Southeast Asian Games and Super Bowl as some of the top anticipated events in 2019, there will be a continued focus on improving the viewing experience of live streaming events. This can be achieved in particular, by improving quality, interactivity, reducing latency, and stepping up content security.

Augmented Reality and Artificial Intelligence will be examples of emerging technology that will be incorporated within live streaming technologies to enhance elements of engagement and advertising.

All-in-one approaches to data security

Even as Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks and data breaches continue to be top concerns for businesses, governments and end-users in the new year, there will be a shift toward the consolidation of services, and more "all-in-one" approaches to cybersecurity.

Content piracy and the battle against ‘fake’ content will shape up to be a new security concern in the near future, and become another impetus for businesses to step up content protection, including adopting OTT as a core part of the content distribution play.

In an age of information warfare, businesses need to ensure that they are at the front line of defence. Taking an all-in-one approach, this will look like integrating forensic watermarking, DRM, and automation to enhance protection capabilities, to ensure that only the legitimate content that is expected gets delivered.

Ensuring scalability on demand

In 2018, edge computing was introduced, which enabled data to be processed close to the source, eliminating latencies inherent in using traditional cloud computing environments, and enabling real time and highly interactive applications.

There will be an acceleration of this trend in 2019, with the emergence of an "edge" closer to the interconnection point with internet service providers. This would allow companies to architect their platforms as micro-services, distribute instances of them to where they need to be instantiated, and then be scaled on demand when they are needed. Most tangibly, result in lower latency applications, reduced operational cost and higher efficiency.

A winning formula for 2019

Even as content demand continues to grow in 2019, the quality of experience needs to take precedence. This will mean an infrastructure that supports an efficient content workflow – speedy delivery of high quality and secure content, and in the appropriate format for the device it is being consumed on.

2019 will be the year of difference for your business with developing scalable and secure infrastructure for evolving business needs, and by extension, the needs of your target audience.