Celebrating 10 Years of NDI: A Conversation with Its Creator, Dr. Andrew Cross, and Kiloview’s Judy Zuo | By The Digital Insider

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As NDI marks its 10th anniversary, one name continues to stand at the center of its story — Dr. Andrew Cross, the visionary who created NDI and first introduced Kiloview to the NDI ecosystem a decade ago.


In this exclusive discussion, Dr. Andrew Cross and Judy Zuo, Vice President of Kiloview, reflect on the origins of NDI, the groundbreaking ideas that shaped its creation, and the technology’s remarkable evolution over the past ten years.


They also share insights into the future of IP-based video production, exploring how innovation and collaboration continue to redefine broadcast workflows.


Watch the full interview and celebrate a decade of progress, creativity, and transformation in the world of NDI:



Learn more about Kiloview below




Read the full transcript:


[Music] Hello everyone. This is Judy from Kil View and welcome to our special interview today. Today I'm going to have a very special guest. Um you know one of the reason for this interview is you know the uh 10th anniversary of NDI and also Kilov is also celebrating our 10 years journey with NDI and of course uh our story with NDI would not be complete if without our guest today uh the creator of NDI Dr. Andrew Cross. So Andrew, welcome, welcome to uh joining me and thank you so much for your time. Uh so tell us how are you? Uh how have you been? And I know you know many of the very early stage NBI fans would be very excited to see you to hear from you. I've been doing well. I've been, you know, I it is just exciting for me to see and continue to see that NDI and what we started what 10 years ago now I can't believe it's I actually find it hard to believe it's 10 years is still something that that is leaving a mark that that that's very humbling and exciting. So um I'm doing well. That's great to hear. So you know we have known each other for many years and this is really the first time we have this kind of chance to sit together talk about NDI. So my great honor and of course um I have to say is if if if without you then we will not really start the NDI journey and right now we know NDI ecosystem has becoming expanding and I know there are quite a lot of the new um NDI adopters, partners and users. uh we are very honored you know we we had the chance to witness the very beginning but I think for quite a lot of the new users new adopters probably they missed the very beginning story so that's why we would like to organize this interview and I would like to uh ask you or you know asking you to share a little bit of the early moments like uh how this crazy idea was born how it was grown and also how do to see the NDI development. So maybe we can start uh talking about the birth of NDI. So my first question for you would be can you actually uh take us back a little bit to the very beginning you know how NDI was born and uh what were you just trying to solve at that time you know at that time maybe 10 years ago it was more bassband and how why are you thinking maybe you you need a new way to move the video around. We started NDI I think for for there were probably a confluence of different things that are the reason why NDI happened. And I think that the um you know the first one was um we believed very strongly that computers would be the future of video production. We you know today I think today we almost take that for granted. I think we do everything on computers today. But you know 101 15 years ago that wasn't an assumption. In fact I think the general assumption was computers are where you check your email. You could never trust it for production. And I think we believed that computers would would become the future of how video is produced. Now the the challenge of course is that computers don't that the native langu language of computers is um is not SDI or um HDMI the native language of computers is going to be IP and so if you believe that the future of production is going to move towards computers and computers the magical thing is that they run software um you must believe that the future future has to be something where video moves over IP. It is easily accessible in software and runs on computers. And th this seemed so obvious except there was nothing in the industry that was really doing this. the the the existing IP protocols. I think there was a recognition that IP could be important, but the the the existing IP protocols were built around not around what software needs were, but around what hardware needs were. And so we saw this huge opportunity, and I shouldn't say that, we saw this need. We our customers needed we needed that to be a way to move video around um that would work really well on computers and would work really well with software. And um we strongly believed um that if we did this that this would be one of the things that allowed you know video production to become possible on computers. And it was it was not to us a question of whether this would happen. It was it was so obvious that this is the direction that things would go and the only question was there's nothing that does it today. Do we wait for somebody else to do it or do we believe that this is important enough that we should do it? And we clearly fell into the category of no we believe this is really important. We believe this is what's going to enable video on computers and so this is something that we should help create and that that is you know kind of the the set of thoughts that led us to creating. That's really a very great idea to start with this kind of you know a a new stuff new new technology to uh bring NDI to bring NBI out and of course I believe you know always um you you are you are the kind of person that you always when you want to do something you will have a kind of vision you want to think big you want to dream big so uh what's what's the very original vision you you wanted to do or you know what's that about the vision? Um, so the the the vision's clear. I think if you you know going back to what I just said, if you believe certain things and if you believe software is the future, you believe computers are the future and you believe that IP video or IP is the native language of computers, it is obvious that you need to solve that problem. And if you do solve that problem, you're solving one of the biggest issues that the industry will face. Like it to me it seemed very clear that the you know that the path of the industry was headed one direction and we needed to stand in the way of that path which is to build a protocol that made it easy to produce live video in software. And in doing so we totally believe that this would be good for us but we also totally believe this is what the what the industry and customers would need. And so um you know it the vision was that if we can do this we help change the way video production is done make it more accessible to more people. And in doing this we you know we we change how video is used. And so those were the things that drove us to do it. And it just seemed a logical outcome from these three core things which were just you know software plus IP plus computers. And if you believe those things, they're still true today. If you believe those things, um then there is no other option but to do this. So that is what you know that is what what drove us and that is what the vision was to create. And I think 10 years later um you know it is clear that those things were right. Um I think it is a very interesting question on whether there's now more more things. um it's not just three maybe there's four or five things but I still believe that this vision those three remain true today yeah I I I think definitely we agree about that and as you mentioned you know the vision is we if we do that we can change it and I can recall in 2019 uh I I believe there was an IB time right uh I think at that time we talked about uh NDI4.5 five or something and together we change the world. I I still believe that slogan. So yeah, you previously mentioned you know right now it's 10 years. So right now we we can see NDI is almost everywhere. Uh it's very widely adopted uh NDI techn the IP technology. So um do you do you feel is is is moving the way that you are envisioned or is just moving a little bit around or what do you think of of the developments in the end now after 10 years? Well, this this is a tough question and I think it is a little bit like asking you if your ch children are amazing and everybody's children. Everybody thinks their children are amazing and NDI is amazing and so I think I would I would never be able to say what I think is wrong with my own children. Let me answer it maybe in a slightly different way and say where the opportunities are for my children. So um I I said clearly that I thought that there were three there were three key things that that are the reason we created it. Software, network and computers. And I I kind of hinted that I think that there are more than three today and I think that um the way we produce software has changed in 10 years. We you know 10 years ago we were using Windows and we were using you know compiled applications and and that's no longer the way a lot of software has develop developed now. I think we're using webstack we're using mobile like the software piece of that has changed over those 10 years and I think the you know it's important to recognize that change and I think it's important to adapt to that change. I think that where we where you know high bandwidth and connectivity was local networks I think that has changed. I think we now we're in a highly interconnected world where increasingly you have access to high bandwidth everywhere and it's still very difficult to send signals around the world as we know from recording this broadcast. We need to solve that. And finally, I think that um you know clearly AI and cloud and browsers like like there's things there that are happening that are changing the way we all develop software, we all use software that are very new those are just you know one or two years old and I think that clearly we need to be thinking around how how video plays into those areas and how those areas help they will make video production fundamentally easier and better and we need to be thinking about how how in the future we we connect all of that together. And so if you if your question was so your your children they're now 10 years old and you're looking at how what is what is the direction you want them to grow in I think those are the areas that I would point to. Okay, that's a very good answer Andrew. So uh you know when we we were talking 10 years ago and 10 years now. So I think quite a lot of things has changed. So even including the you know the AV over IP technologies as you mentioned at that time no one was doing that and then you were thinking about bringing NDI out and right now you know on the market there are quite a lot of uh uh different IP technologies uh audio video technologies. So even for NDI we we we we see we we can see there are challenges there are competitors. So my next question would be um how do you see those kind of new technologies if compared with NDI? Do you think NDI is still very competitive? Um I you know once again I I I want to be you know it's very hard to criticize your children and I I so I don't want to my children are perfect both my real children and NDI and every product I've ever made. Um I think that what made NTI different that there's something like even 10 years ago why why why does NDI seem bigger than just you know 10 years later the the why does NDI seem bigger than just an IP protocol like we could have we could just be saying now look hey did the X transport mechanism you know or the encryption or the codec like were those like how are those looking 10 years told him we did it. I didn't answer the question that way. What I answered was I gave you the reasons why we did it and I gave you what we were trying to achieve. I said that the these were the what we saw as the customer need. The customer need was clearly going to be we need to make production easier on computers. And I think that if the if if protocols like it's not this isn't about what a technology does, it's about what problems that technology solves. And so there are lots of IP protocols today. If any if NDI or any of them are just totally focused on what the big problems for customers are, it makes it bigger than a technology. And so I think while NDI remains that while it remains not a technology but remains something that matters to customers, um it will always be important if it stops doing that then it won't be and then it's just like every other IP protocol. And I think one of the things that that we and I was involved in did very well was make NDI not about the technology. We never went out and talked about how we'd implemented MDNS or how we'd implemented DCTbased compression. Instead, we went out and still today talk about um what we were doing that would make things better for everybody wanting to build video products. um while you stay true to that you will always succeed and the you know others won't um and so as long as NDI continue to do that I I will continue to always believe that that doing things that matter for customers is what wins building technologies is how you do that but it's not a replacement for that so there are lots of IP protocols today um if they the ones that solve customers the customers problems the best will work yeah you know actually uh for this this topic, you know, when we were producing all those kind of uh videos, we once I talked to Jacob about this same question as well and Jacob mentioned actually uh he said the the most exciting point that actually attracted him to uh be continue contributing to the NDI is actually because of the you know the the vision. uh even 10 years ago you have already structured a very good those kind of base you know software based and also um you know thinking about all the possible applications so which actually I believe is because um you know we have the technology sometimes we think you know technology is not really so complicated but uh having the vision having the the base to think about the applications getting everything ready and also having a story that's really inspires people will be more important to making a technology successful. So that's that's that's from you know uh from our side when Jacob was thinking about that or talking about that. So that's that's also why he he always say you already had a very good vision for for those kind of new things and so uh you know I know if we looking ahead we we we will see definitely there are more and more uh companies even including the big companies like you know AWS are all supporting NDI and also uh there are I believe there will be more different adopters uh will be joining the NDI ecosystem. So I mean from from the creators perspective what's your suggestion for all those uh adopters you know or the ecosystem players what's your suggestion for them and even you know your suggestion for kilov what's we can continue on top of ndi maybe some suggestions which direction you see we have the opportunities abs absolutely I I think look um I've spoken spoken about this a number of times over the years at different events. I think that if you take a step back and you you you know once again you think what are what are the what are the problems we're all trying to solve? What are the problems customers and companies and and humans are trying to solve? Um and why um we we get back to you know what what the what the internet has done what global connectivity has done has connected everybody and we use it to communicate with each other. Video is the best way there is of ever communicating. We we it's what humans we get more information through through seeing it than we ever will through hearing it or feeling it or and so it it seems just inevitable to me that the the video and the use of video and making video more accessible to more people and making it easier to produce are absolute truths that will cover every area. And I think that the, you know, every company who is building tools that users use should be very clear that that the the way that users can communicate the best is going to be over video. So, and but it's got to be easy. You've got to make it easy. You've got to make it run anywhere. You've got to make it run on the computers and the systems that they're using, which are not always just computers. It's sometimes mobile now. It's sometimes thermostats now. sometimes light switches now. And but if any if if people remain true to the vision that making video easier and making it more accessible to more people, I think that they will do well. And I think that NDI helped create that. I think that that is still it's still too hard. It's still just video producers who who do it and it it it but if people if every company remains true to the the vision that some point video will be the natural way we all communicate and internet is what enables this. I think that they they will see huge opportunity. Thank you Andrew. So I uh really really appreciate you sharing all those insights and also bring me you know some memories back. So you know when talking about the our common memories um when we you know actually when we designed our NDI booth last month uh I was thinking how we should uh show the sign we really started I mean kilov's journey with NDI where where did we start and actually I just remember the photo you know a kind of picture you sent me you put a wireless and at that time it is not really an NDI encoder but is just a normal encoder on the uh you know the kitchen counter. So actually that's really the sign where Kilo view starts with NDI. So that's really really quite a good memory. Oh, absolutely. learn kil of you you we we we've been I've been working with you since since you know the very first days of India and I think that you know we we worked out together very early on how how can we make devices quickly look hardware hardware normally takes years and years and years to build and and you know we didn't want to wait years and years we wanted to make it so that everybody could access it yeah quickly and kilo view were inspire iring and amazing in helping that that happen. So, NDI ended up with devices long before anybody else. And part of that was, you know, like like our close partners of which you were you were one of the largest at first um helped to make that possible and and that was remarkable and it was fun. Thank you. Thank you. I I mean always you have been helping us a lot, supporting us a lot and also inspiring us a lot. So uh you know at the end of this uh conversation I would really hope our conversation today can also inspire some of the new NDI adopters where also can bring some good memories of all those you know especially the NDI fans initially when you announced NDI. I know there are quite a lot of the crazy followers still following what you are doing what you are thinking about NDI. But I just hope this video can help a little bit. And from Kovio side, we have been so proud to be really um very first and the adopters because of you Andrew. And um we will we will continue we'll continue this journey and of course we will look forward to see what will happen with NDI. So uh thank you. Thank you so much Andrew. Thank you for your time. My pleasure. Thank you for everything. Yeah, just keep well. See you.


Published on The Digital Insider at https://is.gd/4SIAYA.

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