Amagi Planner to Automate Streaming TV Scheduling

Amagi has unveiled Amagi Planner, a content planning and scheduling automation software that eliminates most of the manual efforts in linear TV scheduling.

The software enables streaming TV networks to automate channel programming through a solution that simplifies the process of linear 24/7 channel planning and scheduling. At launch, Circle Network has become one of the early adopters to use the new platform. Circle TV is a linear television and OTT streaming channel dedicated to country music and the country lifestyle.

Amagi Planner works with a three-step process of creating content, putting together a program schedule and exporting the playlist to Cloudport, Amagi’s cloud-based channel creation platform. It is feature-rich and offers access to the content metadata library with a search, sort and filter functionality.

Through Amagi Planner, a scheduler can find the right content and assign various scheduling patterns across multiple days with a few clicks. Content can also be grouped together as a collection to build reusable blocks for quick and repetitive scheduling. Amagi Planner supports content rights management and gives the ability to provide a frequency cap on any media. Ad break scheduling rules can also be configured with Amagi Planner so that the need for manual scheduling of ad breaks in Cloudport is eliminated. Amagi Planner will be available to all existing Cloudport customers as an add-on.

Ryan Imhof, manager of programming for Circle TV, said; “Amagi Planner makes it very easy for our scheduling team to automate our day-to-day scheduling cutting down up to 80 percent of the time spent in programming. It seamlessly integrates with the Cloudport channel creation platform, making the entire process of linear channel creation, scheduling programs, and distributing content a very smooth experience. Amagi PLANNER provides our programming team the ability to mirror our linear broadcast network across our digital distribution.”

Srinivasan KA, co-founder of Amagi, said: “For digital-first companies, scheduling is a complex and time-consuming task that hampers the productivity of content planning and scheduling teams. Amagi Planner offers a new way of scheduling, making it easier to launch dozens of channels with minimal programming resource and time aided by an intuitive web-based user interface. We are delighted to partner with Circle TV and deepen our engagement further.”

Circle TV uses Amagi’s cloud platform for its linear channel creation and distribution to platforms such as The Roku Channel, Xumo, VIZIO, Redbox and Samsung TV Plus.