FUNKE Digital Cut Video Platform Costs

As the digital division of FUNKE Mediengruppe, FUNKE Digital supports digital innovation across newspapers, magazines, video platforms, and FAST (Free Ad-Supported Streaming Television) channels. It wanted to improve the performance and economics of its Kaltura CE video platform used internally and across FUNKE brand websites for editorial video workflows and more. So it migrated from another cloud to Akamai cloud computing services. The move reduced transcoding time by 30%, lowered infrastructure overhead, and enabled a more flexible, cloud-agnostic operating model.

According to Marc Reusch, the Head of Product, Video, and TV Platform at FUNKE Digital, the division relies on the open source version of the Kaltura video management platform to enable video delivery across FUNKE Mediengruppe. 

“Kaltura is deeply integrated into our workloads,” Reusch explained. “It made sense to take ownership of the source code so we could customize it beyond what the SaaS offering allowed.”

Initially, FUNKE Digital hosted Kaltura on a well-known cloud provider because it prioritized cloud-agnostic architecture over hyperscaler lock-in. But over time, infrastructure economics became increasingly difficult to justify. “As we gained a clearer understanding of Kaltura’s compute requirements and scaling patterns, rising costs became impossible to ignore,” he continued.

FUNKE Digital wanted to preserve flexibility rather than become deeply dependent on proprietary hyperscaler services. It also prioritized transparent pricing, predictable infrastructure, and cloud portability.

As an existing Akamai customer for its FAST channels, FUNKE Digital was confident in expanding its use of Akamai cloud computing services for the Kaltura migration. “Akamai provided the flexible cloud compute infrastructure we needed to support scalable video processing, transcoding, and internal media platform workloads. Plus, it offers straightforward, transparent pricing,” said Reusch. 

Working alongside implementation partner Calipso Cloud SL, Reusch quickly completed a proof of concept. “We validated the concept, saw how the rollout would work, and approved the migration.”

Because the Kaltura platform had been designed to remain cloud agnostic, migrating workloads from the old setup to Akamai proved relatively straightforward. During the migration, FUNKE Digital was able to modernize portions of its deployment architecture and operational workflows.

It worked closely with Calipso Cloud SL to optimize the open source Kaltura deployment. It also collaborated with Akamai on architectural refinements that optimized the deployment across approximately 30 to 40 cloud computing nodes.

After migrating to Akamai, FUNKE Digital quickly saw measurable improvements in costs, performance, and infrastructure efficiency. “We reduced egress expenses and saw 20% to 30% faster transcoding times with the same setup,” Reusch explained. “Our editors didn’t have to wait as long for videos to be ready.”

The gains were significant enough that FUNKE Digital reduced infrastructure consumption after migration. “We need fewer machines because the performance of Akamai’s nodes is better than the ones we used before,” he said.

The migration also reduced operational noise and infrastructure unpredictability. “Kaltura is more stable on Akamai,” Reusch said. “We see fewer consumption peaks.”

Just as importantly, the migration occurred without disruption to internal publishing teams. “People never talk about technology that works,” Reusch said. “We migrated to Akamai without any hiccups.”

The smooth Kaltura migration strengthened internal confidence in Akamai as a long-term infrastructure partner. Looking ahead, FUNKE Digital expects Akamai to play an increasingly important role as the organization continues expanding digital video services and streaming innovation. 

“More departments across our company are taking advantage of Akamai’s services because they are compatible with other technologies we employ or might use, such as a microservices architecture. We’re already planning to move more FAST channel workloads to Akamai-powered infrastructure,” Reusch concluded.

FUNKE Digital is a wholly owned subsidiary of the FUNKE Mediengruppe. Leveraging state-of-the-art technologies, agile working methods, and interdisciplinary teams, its departments modernize existing products and expand into new business areas, serving as the digital engine of the group.

One of its digital business divisions is the Media Network, encompassing a broad portfolio of online magazines, online news portals, and video and social media units.

Another division is Digital Services & Performance. This area brings together a wide range of digital business models, from the HR Cluster and complementary leads and listings websites to its digital agencies.