West Palm Beach, FL, November 3, 2026 – PlayBox Neo has taken 24/7 playout for the news outlet Cheddar to the cloud. Powered by PlayBox Neo’s own CDN and the full PlayBox Neo Suite media platform, Cheddar delivers its live and recorded feeds to 27 head-ends worldwide, with full redundancy for uninterrupted service. A robust distribution backbone of 54 connections ensures efficient signal flow between head-ends and end subscribers, supported by built-in failover paths for maximum reliability.
Broadcasting since 2016, Cheddar provides finance and tech news and analysis live and on-demand across all traditional and OTT platforms. Previously, they used on-premise servers in their New York City-based master control facility for playout. When the media outlet was considering moving to a new physical location, they wanted to temporarily install a new on-premise system, aiming for an easy transfer of operations to the new location.
PlayBox Neo was contacted to customize a temporary on-prem playout system. Because of the pending move, it was decided that a different workflow would make it easier to transfer operations. So, instead of an on-premise workflow, PlayBox designed and installed a turnkey solution connected to its private CDN where content is distributed to the network’s head ends.
The cloud-based playout system delivers Cheddar’s 24/7 feed as a fully SSL-secured, multi-bitrate adaptive HLS stream, with synchronized discontinuity handling across every ABR variant to ensure seamless playback on each downstream platform. SCTE-35 ad signaling is carried end-to-end through the workflow, allowing Cheddar’s distribution partners to perform downstream ad insertion and dynamic ad replacement on their own platforms. The feed is delivered in full compliance with the technical specifications required by major FAST and connected TV platforms requirements and is backed by a redundant origin architecture with automatic failover to protect against service interruption.
It worked so well that Cheddar kept the new playout workflow for the long term. They opted not move to a new master control facility that would employ another vendor’s playout system. “This system has worked like a dream for us,” said Thomas Staples, Director of Programming Operations, Cheddar, Inc. “With simple administrative privileges, I can control all playout from the PlayBox server at the private CDN from my home in New York. The cloud charges are significantly lower than we’d pay with a hyperscaler. Also, we never spent money on a new facility because we no longer need to, not to mention the huge savings on rent. The PlayBox Neo Suite running on their own CDN has saved our network a significant amount of money – with zero limitations.”
Cheddar’s PlayBox Neo Suite includes: AirBox Neo for automated content streaming and broadcast playout; TitleBox Neo for interactive graphics creation, and Live Ingest.
“This is exactly the type of application where our system excels,” said Van Duke, Director of U.S. Operations at PlayBox Neo. “Our technology is so flexible, we’re able to customize it precisely to what a customer needs. In this case, we were able to not only create a powerful system for their 24/7 requirements, but we also saved them the high charges typically associated with egress, as well as the costs of designing and maintaining a new physical master control facility. The end result is even greater than we anticipated.”
PlayBox Neo solutions are based on modular products and services which can be easily customized to provide the exact capability needed for any scale of channel playout management – from ingest and scheduling through to transmission. For more information on PlayBox Neo, please visit PlayBox Neo at www.playboxneo.com
