Video Engineer
Video Engineer
Video Engineering Design & Deploy Team
Works in Amsterdam and from home
Lives in Almere
Working at VodafoneZiggo since 2018
When you ask Karel van der Valk what he does for work, he says: "I make sure the Netherlands can enjoy watching TV." He might not mention his excitement at building a new geo-redundant system, unless he's among other techies. As a Video Engineer, he constantly improves VodafoneZiggo's video services. And that demands an eye for innovation.''
"My grandma switches on the TV at six o'clock sharp every day to watch the news. Most Dutch people nowadays, however, consume television on demand rather than traditional, linear programming. Using interactive TV or the Ziggo GO app, they watch their favourite shows when and where they want. Behind such convenience lie complex systems. Together with a team of 20 people, I work on the on-going design and improvement of these systems. We work with several suppliers: some supply the hardware or the platform, others the signal. Our challenge is to tie it all together so that viewers always enjoy uninterrupted, high-quality images with synchronised audio and subtitles."
"Perfect reception, without static: that's our goal. To achieve itthat, we find innovative solutions to give customers the very best TV experience. VodafoneZiggo gives me plenty of freedom to develop good ideas. For example, for the past two years my colleagues, suppliers and I have been building a geo-redundant system. It guarantees that customers can receive a clear signal, even during emergencies. Say that a fire breaks out in a data centre, or a glass fibre is cut during excavation work. That would cut the signal to the surrounding area, and you wouldn't be able to watch TV until it's fixed. Nobody wants that. With geo-redundancy, multiple systems operate in parallel, spread over several geographic locations. When an active system fails, we do a failover; we immediately switch to another system, so consumers barely notice a thing."
"Last November, we conducted a 'fire drill' to test the system at a large scale. In the middle of the night, we simulated an emergency where four million connections were cut due to a failover. That way if something went wrong, only the insomniacs and night owls would notice. It was exciting – I almost wanted to eat a bag of popcorn while I watched. At my house, the failover worked seamlessly. The screen went dark for less than two seconds and then the image came back. My co-workers in other areas said that the black-out lasted a few seconds longer, which is better than expected. Normally viewers would lose their signal for much longer during an emergency. The system is now officially operational. It's unbelievable how motivating that is. It's just so cool to come up with a plan, get the chance to put it into action, and then see it become a success!”
"We’re already working on an exciting next step: we’re going to hook up the geo-redundancy system to AI. That way, the system will automatically conduct a failover when the signal is poor. We're currently looking for the right parties with the right knowledge and resources to help us with that. We always use bleeding-edge, state-of-the-art technology, by the way. It's not only fun to work with, it's also a necessary condition to innovate and stay ahead of the competition."
"In addition to improving the network, I also want to develop myself professionally. After we deploy new video innovations, we hand over the baton to the operational departments. That means giving presentations and workshops. Sometimes I get too enthusiastic and start talking in technical jargon. So I'm going to take a course to learn how to keep it to a minimum. The great thing is that VodafoneZiggo encourages us to develop ourselves. We have access to thousands of courses and training programmes, and we can take as many as we want. Professional development is really valued here."
