Ancast Intelligence Newsletter – Thursday, November 27, 2025

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
This week in the AI, technology, and broadcasting sectors has been marked by significant developments and strategic expansions. Notably, the industry witnessed major announcements from broadcasting giants and tech firms alike, signaling a robust growth trajectory and evolving market dynamics. From Squirrel’s expansion in the Spanish DTT channel market to Sinclair’s bold acquisition move towards EW Scripps, the landscape is rapidly changing, influenced by technological advancements and strategic market positioning. Additionally, the renewal of piracy legislation calls by the Live Content Coalition underscores the ongoing challenges and regulatory focus shaping the future of content distribution and protection.

INDUSTRY NEWS
The convergent media fabric: how AI and the cloud are redefining news production
Raúl Alba, SVP of market and solutions at EVS, discusses how AI and cloud technologies are revolutionizing news production by enhancing storytelling speed, organizational intelligence, and technical agility.
AWS extends HLS Interstitials support for live streams
Amazon Web Services has expanded its HLS Interstitials feature for live streaming, complementing its existing support for VoD and enhancing capabilities across various media workflows.
Live Content Coalition renews live piracy legislation call
The Live Content Coalition, representing Europe’s leading commercial broadcasters and VoD services, sports organizations, and live content producers and exhibitors, has reiterated its support for stronger live piracy legislation in line with European Commission guidelines. This move highlights the growing concerns over content security and copyright integrity in the digital age.
UKTV acquires trio of US dramas from Paramount
UKTV has acquired three US dramas from Paramount Global Content Distribution, including the UK broadcast premiere of NCIS: Sydney Seasons 1 and 2 for U&alibi, as well as NCIS: New Orleans (Seasons 1–7) and another undisclosed title, bolstering its portfolio of international content.
TECHNOLOGY UPDATES
Sinclair tables offer for EW Scripps
The EW Scripps Company has confirmed that it has received “an unsolicited acquisition proposal” from Sinclair. The tabled bid reportedly valued Scripps at $538 million (€466.2m), highlighting the ongoing consolidation trends within the media and broadcasting industry.
How the cinematography of Train Dreams makes the film feel ‘grounded and honest’
Cinematographer Adolpho Veloso explains how focusing on human experiences in ‘Train Dreams’ allows the seamless integration of modern technology, ensuring the film remains authentic and relatable.
AAPA backs EU action on online piracy
Online piracy has evolved into a structural threat to Europe’s cultural sovereignty, competitiveness, and consumer safety, according to the Alliance Against Audiovisual Piracy (AAPA). The Alliance supports the EU’s recent actions to combat this pervasive issue, emphasizing the need for robust legislative frameworks.
Eutelsat raises €670m in rights issue
Eutelsat has announced the launch of a €670 million rights issue as part of its €1.5 billion capital raise to reinforce its financial structure and fund strategic ambitions. This move is expected to provide the satellite operator with the necessary capital to pursue further expansion and technological upgrades.
MARKET TRENDS
Best in Market Awards 2025 deadline extended
The deadline for submissions to the Best in Market Awards 2025 has been extended to November 28th, with winners to be announced in mid-December.
Ofcom calls for input on UK broadcast regulatory changes
UK regulator Ofcom is seeking industry feedback to inform potential regulatory changes in TV distribution, considering both market trends and governmental decisions.
Forecast: Sports rights spend to exceed $78bn by 2030
Ampere Analysis has released its latest forecast for global sports rights media spend, predicting that global investment will surpass $78 billion (€67.6bn) by 2030, an increase of 20 percent from 2025. This growth is driven by escalating demand for live sports content and the proliferation of streaming platforms.

LOOKING AHEAD
As we look to the future, the broadcasting and technology industries are poised for further transformation. The ongoing consolidation, as seen with Sinclair’s move for EW Scripps, and the expansion into new markets by entities like Squirrel, are indicative of a broader trend towards globalization and digital integration. Moreover, the increasing focus on combating online piracy through enhanced legislation reflects a crucial pivot towards securing intellectual property rights in a digital-first world. These developments not only highlight the dynamism of these sectors but also forecast a highly competitive and innovative landscape ahead.
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Featured Blog Posts
Client: Adaptable International – Awe Realm Studios, Fukuoka, Japan What happens when visionary talent is held back by bandwidth? That’s the question we helped answer in our latest consulting engagement with Adaptable International—a music production and content studio based in Fukuoka, Japan. Founder Tom Southerton, operating solo out of a premium creative studio, faced a common problem: incredible creative potential—but limited time, zero scalable workflows, and a studio sitting below its potential. 🎯 The Challenge Tom was operating solo in a fully equipped, acoustically treated studio in Japan. But the business was bottlenecked by bandwidth It was clear: the studio had scale potential. But it needed a strategy. 🚀 The Solution: AI x Digital Nomad Talent Over a 2-week embedded consulting sprint, Ancast Intelligence developed a transformation strategy combining: 🔧 Deliverables Included: 📊 Forecasted Impact 👇 Why It Matters This wasn’t just about tech. It was about unlocking time, creativity, and new business models. For solopreneurs, boutique agencies, and creative founders—this project proves that scaling doesn’t mean losing control. It’s possible to automate the grind, protect your creative energy, and build something that works while you sleep (or jam). This strategy doesn’t just solve a production problem—it redefines what’s possible for solo creative entrepreneurs. It blends automation, real-world community, and AI-enabled scale without sacrificing authenticity. For small teams or founders looking to do more with less, this is the blueprint: 🔹 Human-centred AI workflows 🔹 Creative systemization 🔹 Smart collaboration models 🎛️ Want something similar? Explore ancast.co.uk or try out the conversational AI agent on our site—ask it about this project, our services, or how we build scalable AI solutions for creative businesses. Explore our strategy consulting and product innovation services at Ancast Intelligence or try our AI voice agent—ask it about this very project. #AIConsulting #DigitalTransformation #CreativeBusiness #VoiceAI #AIWorkflows #SolopreneurTools #RemoteWorkSolutions #DigitalNomadLife #ContentAutomation #MusicBusiness #AIinMedia #TechForCreatives #FutureOfWork #ScaleSmart #AdaptableByDesign
💡 Executive Summary Conversational AI is rapidly redefining how companies engage with customers — but it’s voice, not just text, that’s setting the next frontier. AI voicebots now allow brands to hold intelligent, human-like voice conversations at scale, enabling real-time support, sales engagement, onboarding, and more. At Ancast Intelligence, we’ve been exploring how voice-driven agents can augment human teams, reduce operational overhead, and create powerful new customer experiences — without the constraints of traditional IVR systems or live agent bottlenecks. 🎙️ Real Conversations. Real Impact. Voicebots are here. In a world where digital interactions often feel cold and mechanical, AI voicebots bring warmth and presence back into customer conversations — and they’re proving to be game-changers across industries. At Ancast Intelligence, we began experimenting with voice agents in mid-2025, following a demo of a basic RAG (retrieval augmented generation) chatbot during the UC Berkeley AI course. That demo, while simple, sparked something bigger — what if we could give that chatbot a voice? Already using ElevenLabs for podcast narration, we discovered its powerful voice agent capabilities and quickly built a conversational AI assistant, powered by our own cloned voice and a finely tuned knowledge base. The result? A seamless voicebot that now interacts with visitors on our site, guiding them through: And crucially — it feels like you’re talking directly to our founder. 🎙️ Why Voicebots (Not Just Chatbots)? Chatbots are now commonplace, but voice is how humans naturally communicate. AI voicebots unlock: Voice isn’t replacing people. It’s extending teams with superpowers. 📺 Broadcast & Media: Industry-Specific Applications With our deep background in broadcast workflows, we see several powerful use cases: 💡 Use Cases That Transcend Industries Voicebots are no longer a novelty. They’re intelligent, always-on assistants that can streamline operations, enhance user experience, and extend your team’s capabilities. 🏥 Healthcare 24/7 symptom checkers, Appointment confirmations, Post-visit surveys, Wellness reminders 🏢 Real Estate & Property Virtual property tours, Real-time Q&A about listings, Rental application screening, Multilingual tenant support 🛍️ E-commerce & Retail Conversational order tracking, Returns/refund queries, FAQ bots for product info, Loyalty program assistants 🎓 Education & Training Onboarding for online courses, Personalized tutoring, Answering admissions FAQs, Voice-led surveys and feedback collection 💼 Recruitment Vacancy match conversations, Candidate Q&A with a recruiter voice, Interview prep voice coaches, Auto-scheduling follow-ups 📞 B2B & Professional Services Lead qualification, Discovery calls, Explaining complex services with tone and clarity, Embeddable widgets on every client-facing page 🔍 The Tech Behind It Modern voicebots aren’t built on decision trees. They’re powered by: We build agents that learn, improve, and adapt to real-world customer interactions over time — not just regurgitate scripted flows. 🤖 Human in the Loop: Augmented, Not Replaced We’re not advocating for replacing teams — we’re augmenting them. Voicebots can handle the repetitive, high-frequency tasks so that your teams can focus on storytelling, strategy, and relationships. In broadcast, that might mean helping schedulers focus on macro programming trends. In property, it’s about freeing agents to handle serious leads. Across the board, voicebots reduce burnout, accelerate workflows, and increase satisfaction. 🚀 What We Built at Ancast Our voice agent: 🧠 Try the Voicebot Experience Want to hear what it sounds like to talk to an AI voice agent — or better yet, yourself? 👉 Visit our site to chat with our voice agent #Voicebots #ConversationalAI #AI #VoiceTech #BroadcastAI #AIConsulting #LLM #AugmentedIntelligence #AncastIntelligence #CustomerExperience
June 21st, 2025 By Ben Anchor Capstone project submitted for the Berkeley Executive Education Program in AI Strategy (April – June 2025) 📌 Executive Summary During my time at Berkeley, I explored a business case that had been forming in my consulting work: could external, real-time signals (like search trends, news sentiment, or social media) be used to inform broadcast scheduling — not to replace human decision-making, but to augment it intelligently? Rather than presenting a technical build or proof of concept, this capstone was designed as an eight-slide business case, showing how broadcasters might benefit from AI-powered scheduling layered with human editorial oversight. 🎯 The Challenge In the first module of the program, we were prompted to define a potential capstone topic — a “straw man” use case ripe for AI application. I initially considered projects related to accessibility in live sports and real-time captioning workflows, but I eventually settled on something that aligned more closely with my decade of experience: intelligent scheduling for server-based playout systems. Scheduling teams — the people responsible for aligning programming, creative content, and commercial obligations — work in high-pressure, manual environments. The aim of this project was to explore whether AI agents, augmented with external signals, could support these teams in making faster, audience-led decisions. 🧪 The Approach The capstone proposed a model that could ingest historical broadcast schedules, recent performance data, and third-party signals — such as: The concept wasn’t about full automation. Instead, it focused on “augmented intelligence” — with a human-in-the-loop approach designed to maintain trust and editorial oversight. To give it a realistic framework, I modeled the project using metrics like Mean Absolute Percentage Error (MAPE) — commonly used to track the gap between forecasted and actual viewership. Thresholds were established to guide how much intervention might be required, depending on performance range The plan also accounted for future hand-off to ML Ops teams to handle retraining, monitor model drift, and ensure the AI system would remain calibrated to changing audience behaviors and broadcast cycles. 💬 Reflections This capstone project felt like the culmination of the last ten years of my work in broadcasting — migrating scheduling systems, working side-by-side with programming teams, and observing how operational bottlenecks emerge. It also reframed what AI can offer to the industry. Instead of replacing creative and strategic input, this system is designed to free up time, so teams can focus on bigger-picture storytelling, campaign planning, and strategic collaboration — not just lining up promos in a spreadsheet.And importantly, it lets broadcasters respond to change at the speed of culture — adapting to shifts in minutes or hours, rather than days. 🚀 What’s Next This isn’t just a concept on slides — it’s now being positioned as part of the strategic advisory services we offer through Ancast Intelligence. Whether you’re exploring AI scheduling, signal-based insights, or the future of audience workflows, feel free to connect for a full slide deck presentation. 📬 contact@ancast.co.uk 🌐 Visit the new website!