AWS for M&E Blog
Warner Bros. Discovery reinvents linear television advertising with AWS
When brands run ads during linear free-to-air (FTA) broadcasts, they can loosely target messages based on a program’s viewer demographics, but they’re generally casting a wide net. There’s limited visibility into whether they’re reaching the intended audience and if the message engages the viewer. Committed to shaking up the status quo, the Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) European digital team recently collaborated with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to develop a new approach for FTA personalized ad insertion.
WBD broadcasts use the hybrid broadcast broadband television (HbbTV) standard in this region. HbbTV-enabled televisions support interactive services by combining traditional broadcast reception with broadband internet connectivity. Leveraging HbbTV features, WBD and AWS built a solution using AWS Media Services to provide addressable advertising for FTA channels. First launched in Italy, the solution is already making the WBD regionally targeted ad inventory as much as eight times more valuable.
“Free-to-air TV is still dominant in Europe, and we think there’s a lot of potential for innovation in linear TV. In Italy alone, FTA reaches 48 million households,” explained Luca Nicoli, Vice President of Warner Bros. Discovery. “HbbTV was a big advancement that enabled TV interactivity. We’re now in a place where we have the technology to significantly transform the linear experience.”
Prioritizing the audience experience
Part of FTA linear TV’s appeal is the lean-back experience it provides. Audiences can turn on their devices and watch a program immediately, without navigating through an app, but they might miss parts if they tune in late. In addition to the new server-side ad insertion solution, WBD developed a solution that enables viewers on its FTA channels to restart a program from the beginning. It provides proxy video on demand (VOD) functionality without disrupting the linear viewing experience.
Additionally, since the broadcast stream is based on internet protocol (IP), advertising messages can be customized, making them more relevant and the placements higher value. The ads are also seamlessly integrated so they don’t detract from the viewing experience as much as they would if delivered through typical pre-roll or mid-roll mechanisms.
The AWS engine underpinning server-side ad insertion
The server-side ad insertion of the WBD solution ingests live video sources using AWS Elemental MediaConnect. Then, AWS Elemental MediaLive encodes the content, AWS Elemental MediaConvert prepares the ad assets, and AWS Elemental MediaPackage prepares it for distribution through the Amazon CloudFront content delivery network. AWS Elemental MediaTailor handles the personalized ad insertion, ultimately helping WBD create a new linear business model.
“All of our applications run on AWS. This includes the full supply chain in terms of ingestion of content, manipulation and live feeds connecting directly throughout. Our distribution engineering organization is using AWS for digital playouts and we’re starting to work with Amazon Advertising for Amazon DSP integration and advertising capabilities,” noted Nicoli. “The fact that we can get all these different pieces of technology from one vendor and build it all, end-to-end, massively simplifies our work and is a key benefit of working with AWS.”
Samuele Macchi, Director Technical Development at Warner Bros. Discovery, added, “We needed an ad-insertion workflow capable of supporting true start-over functionality on HbbTV while preserving broadcast-quality reliability. By integrating AWS Elemental MediaTailor directly with our linear origin and HbbTV application logic, we established a deterministic SSAI workflow that reliably generates session-specific manifest manipulations for every restart event. MediaTailor’s SCTE-35 handling, ad-break normalization, and runtime manifest stitching allowed us to maintain consistent latency and playback continuity across a highly fragmented device landscape. This architecture enables dynamic ad monetization on our broadcast streams without requiring client-side logic changes or impacting the user’s start-over experience.”
Image 1: AWS architecture diagram illustrating a live video streaming workflow.
An evolving engagement
The latest work between WBD and AWS is an extension of a nearly decade-long partnership. As an organization, WBD started working with AWS using computing and storage. Over time, WBD expanded its implementation to include the use of more managed services.
“Our journey with AWS is a constant evolution,” shared Warner Bros. Discovery Senior Software Manager Mirko Arena. “From a developer point of view, I know I can use AWS services to build applications on my own from scratch or use managed services, and that flexibility is so valuable.
And when we encounter a challenge or need a new feature, we have great interactions with AWS; it’s a win-win partnership.”
“I think AWS is akin to a spinning wheel: the more you use it, the more convenient it is to incorporate additional services,” Nicoli added. “In a large global corporation like ours, having well-managed support at the local level has been a gigantic plus. This is on top of the quality that AWS provides.”
AWS Elemental MediaConvert has been an important component of the WBD VOD transcoding pipeline since 2021. Then, the company began using AWS Elemental MediaLive for encoding live content. The addition of AWS Elemental MediaTailor helped WBD unlock addressable advertising in FTA linear television. The WBD team worked closely with AWS to integrate MediaTailor with the DVR functionality of MediaPackage and to define custom user profiles. After about five months of development and testing, WBD launched the new FTA personalized ad solution in Italy, and the team quickly saw a sizable uptick in viewer engagement.
Image 2: AWS architecture diagram showing a video content delivery workflow.
“The key parameter we’re following is viewer engagement. Based on initial data, not only are more viewers accessing our VOD feature, but they’re also watching for longer. Previously, a viewer would average two to three minutes of ad content each session. Now, they’re averaging 20 minutes each session,” said Nicoli. “At the same time, targeted ad inventory is as much as eight times more valuable. That’s quite significant and we can scale it across other channels and markets.”
“We also have direct access to all our logs and can decide how to use that information, instead of relying on a third party,” noted Arena. “We can take that raw data from AWS and use it to guide development and forecasting, for AI applications, or however we need.”
Scaling to new markets
Based on the solution’s success in Italy, WBD is already looking at launching the solution in other geographies, including Poland, Spain, and Germany. While the framework is already proven, each new geography release requires a two- or three-month testing period to ensure compatibility across devices in the region. By building on AWS, WBD can be technically innovative and operationally efficient.
“Time is of value, and AWS services reduce the integration effort that we need to put the solution in place,” concluded Nicoli. “Also, AWS stands out in terms of media and video delivery, and these are core to our business.”
Learn more about AWS Media Services, or get in touch with an AWS for Media & Entertainment representative.