As traditional pay TV providers reach more types of screens, and as more over-the-top video players enter the fray, managing and accounting for massive amounts of content — with respect to tricky distribution rights — has become increasingly complex and fragmented. Given the intricacies of those rights, which include the kinds of devices content can be offered on and when (and for how much), rights management systems have been pivoting away from tedious, manual processes to more automated (and accurate) systems powered by the proverbial cloud.

This trend has played into the hands of digital rights management companies such as Mediamorph, which now works with the world’s top 10 content studios, traditional pay TV providers such as Liberty Global, digitally focused distributors such as Cinedigm, and an array of OTT video specialists such as Ellation, a company tied to Otter Media, the AT&T-The Chernin Group joint venture.

Related: Ellation Taps Mediamorph to Manage Content Rights, Contracts

Multichannel News recently caught up with Mediamorph CEO Rob Gardos to discuss how rights management systems have evolved to meet the challenges of multiscreen video and OTT delivery. An edited transcript follows.

MCN: What are your top priorities this year?
Rob Gardos: I think one of the biggest areas that we’ve been trying to focus on is making the supply chain around publishing as seamless and reliable as the playout experience. You’ve got this mess in the middle, starting from when content providers say, “Get us content that you’re allowed to exploit,” to ultimately that content being made available.

Mediamorph for the past few years has been building — and it has been an uphill battle, I’ll tell you — a lot of the pieces to facilitate the seamless exchange of information: What kind of content is available and when it’s available and how it’s available and what are the financial terms related to its availability. This is the year where that full cycle of content is going upstream seamlessly and money is going downstream seamlessly.

MCN: What’s been the greatest change in rights management in recent years? Is it all now about automation and cloud-powered systems and a move away from more difficult manual processes?
RG: This is not a challenge around rights. This is a challenge around an operational workflow. And it’s something that the industry, I think, is getting a lot better at recognizing as something that is of huge importance.

When I think of the operational workflow, it’s akin to a physical fulfillment workflow — I want a product, I order it, FedEx picks it up, they scan it and it gets delivered. The rights and rules that make up that package all happen beforehand.

What we have found is the need to grab information from all of these different systems to actually execute on that properly. You need to get information rights systems. You need to get information from traditional financial systems, traditional operational fulfillment systems that are internal. Some of the big customers we integrate to [involve] no fewer than 10 systems. And that’s the low number.

The hardest part is … how to normalize [that information] so, essentially, you’re speaking some common language.

MCN: So how do you drive that commonality?
RG: Part of it is this: The more we can embrace standards, the better. We don’t want to recreate the wheel. But the hard part is getting all of this information in and getting it to conform to the standard.

MCN: How has the emergence of over-the-top and multiscreen distribution affected your business? Has that accelerated things?
RG: It’s accelerating things materially. There’s a bunch of new distribution players.

We support specific players that deliver their content over-the-top, including SVOD [subscription video-on-demand] and pure AVOD [ad-based VOD].

But even more so, the traditional MSOs are extending and providing new ways for their customers to consume content. This has happened a lot internationally. You’ve got a variety of legacy platforms that they now have to support — they have set-top box platforms, they have mobile platforms, they have an over-the-top platform.

All of that needs to be centralized. That’s been a huge driver. It increases complexity, and the last thing that these folks want is another set of manual processes and manual profiles and more Excel [spreadsheets] and other things that they use right now. With nearly every implementation … we’re always integrating with a legacy system and some newfangled OTT system.

MCN: Where are you seeing the most growth coming from these days? Is it coming by way of traditional programmers and content suppliers that are pursuing OTT now, or is it from new, pure-play OTTs?
RG: It’s a mix. Some of the traditional players are using it as a vehicle to protect their subscriber-recurring revenue, and some of them — even a few of the traditional players — are looking at ways to increase ARPU [average revenue per user], recognizing full well that they are losing traditional customers who are cutting the cord.

A good [OTT] example is Crunchyroll and Ellation. [Crunchyroll is the anime-focused SVOD service that’s owned by Ellation.] That’s very indicative of new opportunities we have where a provider is reaching critical mass and they need to keep up with all of the content. The ones that are sort of hitting their stride, they quickly realize that the manual processes they have currently are not sustainable. And that’s driving a lot of growth for us.

Mediamorph said Hulu has picked the cloud-based rights management firm to help the OTT-SVOD provider improve its contract management capabilities and assess the financial value of its growing content library.

Mediamorph said the deal came together amid content deal structures that are growing increasingly sophisticated, and that its platform will provide Hulu with insight into content costs and how they can help to drive decisions on future investment.

Hulu  announced last week that it was nearing 12 million SVOD subs and confirmed that it is looking to expand its repertoire with a new virtual MVPD service that will feature skinny TV packages.

Mediamorph’s said its “rights-aware” Deals contract module enables clients to manage, control, and analyze contracts in a centrally while supporting complex and evolving financial deal elements that are becoming more common in content distribution deals. Its Accounting and Analytics modules, meanwhile, provide insights into content costs and calculate amortization schedules, generate accrual reports, and produce supplier payment records.

“We are thrilled to be working with Hulu, a pioneer and leader in streaming TV,” said Rob Gardos, CEO of Mediamorph. “Contracts, titles, and rights have exploded in the digital age. Our platform provides our customers improved understanding of costs and revenue drivers of their most valuable asset – their content. We look forward to helping Hulu continue to lead the pack as their service grows exponentially in the years ahead.”

Separately, Mediamorph announced that Millicom, a provider with more than 62 million customers in Latin America and Africa, has selected it platform to fuel and accelerate growth for services such as Tigo Star (its satellite TV offering), as well as residential cable and other TV offerings.

Other Mediamorph customers include A&E Networks, AMC Networks, BBC Worldwide, CenturyLink, Liberty Global, NBCUniversal, Paramount Pictures, Starz Media, Turner Networks, Warner Bros, and Viacom, among others.

Mediamorph, a maker of cloud-based rights management systems, has tapped former Vubiquity exec Jim Riley as chief revenue officer, where he’ll be tasked with heading up the company’s global revenue expansion.

Mediamorph said Riley will lead the company’s sales team across all products, verticals, and territories. On the product side, he will focus on Mediamorph’s  cloud-based platform spanning content rights, contract management, royalty processing automation, and digital supply chain optimization for video models such as SVOD and over-the-top distribution.

A vet of the cable industry, Riley, who was named to The Cable Center’s Cable TV Pioneers in 2014, helped to grow AMC Networks and was part of the E! launch team before joining video-on-demand distribution pioneer TVN Entertainment in 2000, which merged with Avail Media in 2009. Avail-TVN was rebranded as Vubiquity in 2013.

“Jim has always been an industry thought leader and advocate for innovative solutions that meet the demands of a changing global media business,” Eddy Zervigon, former Morgan Stanley managing director and TVN board member. “As media deals grow increasingly complex and personalized TV evolves, I predict that Jim will apply his expertise to expand the Mediamorph value proposition and create monetization opportunities for content owners, providers, and distributors.”

“Jim understands the significant changes facing the media space and he knows how to address them - just as he did with a nascent VOD industry,” added Rob Gardos, Mediamorph’s CEO. “Jim will help Mediamorph drive innovative leading-edge solutions for a changing industry.  Adding Jim to the team allows us to transition Steve Pitts to a larger delivery role as EVP - Global Services, working more closely with strategic customers.”