The Shaw Media television network – shawmedia.ca – known as Global TV, reaches almost 100 percent of Canadians and is complemented by 19 specialty channels, including Global News and Food Network Canada, all powered by the Ektron web content management platform. “Shaw acquired the properties that became Shaw Media in late 2010,” says Robert Levy, Director of Design and Technology for the Digital Media Group at Shaw Media. “Due to the terms of the agreement, the new company came into Shaw with no data centre or content management system. Obviously, we needed to rectify that situation quickly.” Shaw brought in IBM as a consultant, and asked the technology giant to create a business requirements document defining what the company needed in a CMS for their media division. IBM produced a short list of enterprise-scale vendors who could meet the unique needs of Shaw Media. The list included Autonomy Interwoven, FatWire… and Ektron. “We liked the technology stack,” says Robert Levy in answer to the question on what drove the final choice to Ektron. “Ektron was on the Microsoft .NET stack and we were proficient in that. And we liked the pricing. We liked the agility of Ektron. It just seemed to be a more lightweight, simple solution than the others.” Shaw Media in the Amazon Cloud Augusto Rosa manages the Server Operation team responsible for Shaw Media websites and all related applications. As well as a new content management system, Shaw Media needed to implement a new infrastructure. “We had inherited an infrastructure that didn’t meet current business goals,” explains Rosa. “Our data centers in Winnipeg and Toronto were a challenge to manage. We had frequent power outages and hours of downtime.” After investigating options, Shaw Media decided on Amazon Web Services (AWS).

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THE SHAW MEDIA TELEVISION NETWORK –
SHAWMEDIA.CA – KNOWN AS GLOBAL TV,
REACHES ALMOST 100 PERCENT OF CANADIANS
AND IS COMPLEMENTED BY 19 SPECIALTY CHANNELS,
INCLUDING GLOBAL NEWS AND FOOD NETWORK
CANADA, ALL POWERED BY THE EKTRON WEB
CONTENT MANAGEMENT PLATFORM.
To Learn More
Follow Us @Ektron or Visit ektron.com/CaseStudies

2. E N T E R P R I S E S C A L E : S H AW M E D I A L E V E R A G E S T H E A M A Z O N C L O U D F O R I T S E K T R O N C M S
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“ Ektron was on the Microsoft .NET
stack and we were proficient in that.
And we liked the pricing. We liked the
agility of Ektron. It just seemed to be
a more lightweight, simple solution
than the others. ”
To Learn More
Follow Us @Ektron or Visit ektron.com/CaseStudies

3. E N T E R P R I S E S C A L E : S H AW M E D I A L E V E R A G E S T H E A M A Z O N C L O U D F O R I T S E K T R O N C M S
t
“ Our first Ektron site went live on
the Amazon Cloud in just four weeks,
including planning and development.
After that, we implemented a full
migration of 29 websites and related
web services in 10 months ”
To Learn More
Follow Us @Ektron or Visit ektron.com/CaseStudies

4. E N T E R P R I S E S C A L E : S H AW M E D I A L E V E R A G E S T H E A M A Z O N C L O U D F O R I T S E K T R O N C M S
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BUSINESS BENEFITS
• Downtime significantly reduced. Average uptime
increased rapidly from 98.8% to 99.9% without
re-architecting applications.
• Disaster recovery strategy implemented at a fraction
of the cost of a second physical site
• Shaw Media sites collectively handle more than one
million client requests per day – an average of 30
million per month - on the Ektron platform in the
Amazon Cloud.
• “The Amazon Cloud gives us the ability to be agile and
scale to meet editorial and business objectives while
keeping our operational and capital costs low.”

5. Delivering enterprise Web Content Management Software
and Digital Experience Management solutions. Ektron empowers
organizations to fully realize their digital marketing potential
by Connecting Content to Revenue.
Founded in 1998
Headquarters in Nashua, NH
Worldwide Offices in Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom
Regional Offices in Denver, Richmond, and San Francisco
Over 3,800 customers and 12,000 sites including Fairmont Raffles
Hotels International, Las Vegas Sands, Microsoft, and NASDAQ
200+ Employees