UC Secures Systemwide Kaltura Agreement

The University of California has secured a systemwide agreement for Kaltura as an enterprise video content management (EVCM) solution.

By Mark Hersberger, Communications Manager

As announced on the UC IT Blog, the University of California has secured a systemwide agreement for Kaltura as an enterprise video content management (EVCM) solution. 

UC San Diego has used Kaltura for several years, but the dawn of the Age of Covid necessitated and accelerated the need for a systemwide agreement, explained Robin Martin, IT Services’ Director of Media Services. “We saw, coming through the COVID pandemic, the usage of video across the board for instructional and business purposes go through the roof and became a norm of hybrid and remote work,” he said. 

In particular, Kaltura has become UC San Diego’s long-term repository for Zoom cloud recordings, as they expire from Zoom after 30 days. Robin also notes that Kaltura permits unlimited videos, unlimited storage, and unlimited bandwidth, which is crucial to avoiding general overage charges, especially during a crisis like the start of Covid. Kaltura is integrated into Canvas for instructors to store and present their course content. Meanwhile, administrative staff use it to host and present videos as an alternative to YouTube. 

Robin was part of the committee that worked with UCOP, along with Dan Suchy, IT Services’ Senior Director of Educational Technology Services, on the request for proposal (in addition to Kaltura, a solution called YuJa was also adopted systemwide). “I really appreciated the opportunity to contribute and learn how other campuses are solving these same kinds of problems,” he reflected. “It’s always good to see where campuses are in alignment and where we take different approaches, and I was very impressed with the methodical approach UCOP took.”

Robin’s looking forward to further leveraging Kaltura and exploring YuJa. He said, “I think the fact we ended up with two vendors is an interesting aspect of the process. One of the great outcomes is, we have five-year commitments on pricing from both, so it’s nice to be able to plan that far ahead and not worry about costs increasing astronomically for such a critical need. It also gives us flexibility at a future point if Kaltura no longer meets our needs or we want to pilot test another video platform.”