Bitmovin is a multimedia technology company which provides services that

transcode Transcoding is the direct digital-to-digital conversion of one encoding to another, such as for video data files, audio files (e.g., MP3, WAV), or character encoding (e.g., UTF-8, ISO/IEC 8859). This is usually done in cases where a target devic ...

digital video Digital video is an electronic representation of moving visual images (video) in the form of encoded digital data. This is in contrast to analog video, which represents moving visual images in the form of analog signals. Digital video comprises ...

and audio to streaming formats using

cloud computing Cloud computing is the on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data storage ( cloud storage) and computing power, without direct active management by the user. Large clouds often have functions distributed over mul ...

, and streaming media players. Founded in 2013, the Austrian company contributes to

MPEG-DASH Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH), also known as MPEG-DASH, is an adaptive bitrate streaming technique that enables high quality streaming of media content over the Internet delivered from conventional HTTP web servers. Similar to Apple ...

, an

open standard An open standard is a standard that is openly accessible and usable by anyone. It is also a prerequisite to use open license, non-discrimination and extensibility. Typically, anybody can participate in the development. There is no single definition ...

that allows streaming video to be played in

HTML5 video The HTML5 specification introduced the video element for the purpose of playing videos, partially replacing the object element. HTML5 video is intended by its creators to become the new standard way to show video on the web, instead of the previo ...

and

Flash Flash, flashes, or FLASH may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional aliases * Flash (DC Comics character), several DC Comics superheroes with super speed: ** Flash (Barry Allen) ** Flash (Jay Garrick) ** Wally West, the first Kid ...

players.

History

Bitmovin was founded in 2013 after research and standardization in the area of

at the

University of Klagenfurt The University of Klagenfurt (german: Universität Klagenfurt or ''Alpen-Adria-Universität Klagenfurt'', AAU) is a federal Austrian research university and the largest research and higher education institution in the state of Carinthia. It has it ...

. In 2014 the company secured an investment round with the venture capital fond Speedinvest and Constantia Industries. In 2014, the company was part of the top 100 companies in online media. Bitmovin is the author of the

reference software

libdash libdash is a computer software library which provides an object-oriented interface to the Dynamic Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) standard. It is also the official reference implementation of the ISO/IEC MPEG-DASH standard, and maintained by t ...

and contributes to the standardization at

MPEG The Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) is an alliance of working groups established jointly by International Organization for Standardization, ISO and International Electrotechnical Commission, IEC that sets standards for media coding, includ ...

, DASH-IF,

IETF The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is a standards organization for the Internet and is responsible for the technical standards that make up the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP). It has no formal membership roster or requirements and a ...

, etc. In 2015, Bitmovin participated in the YCombinator program.

Products

The company provides the cloud-based transcoding service bitcodin, which increases the efficiency of transcoding by using

Cloud computing Cloud computing is the on-demand availability of computer system resources, especially data storage ( cloud storage) and computing power, without direct active management by the user. Large clouds often have functions distributed over mul ...

, and also enables transcoding of ultra-high definition video. The company also created the HTML5 and Flash-based Web player bitdash which can be used in

Web Browser A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on ...

s on desktop computers and

smartphone A smartphone is a portable computer device that combines mobile telephone and computing functions into one unit. They are distinguished from feature phones by their stronger hardware capabilities and extensive mobile operating systems, whic ...

s. This player supports the streaming and playback of

or Apple's

HTTP Live Streaming HTTP Live Streaming (also known as HLS) is an HTTP-based adaptive bitrate streaming communications protocol developed by Apple Inc. and released in 2009. Support for the protocol is widespread in media players, web browsers, mobile devices, and st ...

, using either the HTML5

Media Source Extensions Media Source Extensions (MSE) is a W3C specification that allows JavaScript to send byte streams to media codecs within Web browsers that support HTML5 video and audio. Among other possible uses, this allows the implementation of client-side prefe ...

or Flash, depending on the platform.

DRM DRM may refer to: Government, military and politics * Defense reform movement, U.S. campaign inspired by Col. John Boyd * Democratic Republic of Madagascar, a former socialist state (1975–1992) on Madagascar * Direction du renseignement milita ...

is enabled through the usage of the HTML5

Encrypted Media Extensions Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) is a W3C specification for providing a communication channel between web browsers and the Content Decryption Module (CDM) software which implements digital rights management (DRM). This allows the use of HTML5 vi ...

as well as Flash. It is compatible to tools such as

x264 x264 is a free and open-source software library and a command-line utility developed by VideoLAN for encoding video streams into the H.264/MPEG-4 AVC video coding format. It is released under the terms of the GNU General Public License. Histor ...

MP4Box GPAC Project on Advanced Content (GPAC, a recursive acronym) is an implementation of the MPEG-4 Systems standard written in ANSI C. GPAC provides tools for media playback, vector graphics and 3D rendering, MPEG-4 authoring and distribution. GP ...

Usage

* Live or on-demand transcoding of video or audio streaming to HLS, progressive and

DASH The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen b ...

* Web-based players for streaming for HLS, progressive and

content in

HTML5 HTML5 is a markup language used for structuring and presenting content on the World Wide Web. It is the fifth and final major HTML version that is a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommendation. The current specification is known as the HTML ...

* Streaming of

protected content in

References

{{Reflist Streaming software Streaming media systems Media servers Internet properties established in 2013