Election night puts broadcast infrastructure under a very specific kind of pressure as continuously arriving results and rapidly increasing data volumes have to be processed while the newsroom is live.
There are no opportunities to stop the broadcast and troubleshoot. A frozen graphic or delayed data feed can immediately affect what anchors are able to show and explain on air. At a time when audiences are closely following results as they change, broadcasters need confidence that the information appearing on screen is current and that the systems supporting it will remain reliable throughout the night.
Over the years, I've watched the industry conversation move from on-premise infrastructure to cloud hosting and, more recently, to cloud-native production. Those terms are sometimes used interchangeably, but there is an important difference.
Moving existing software to a cloud environment doesn't necessarily change how the software was designed to operate. A cloud-native platform is built from the beginning to take advantage of the cloud, including centralized processing, managed infrastructure, system monitoring, and browser-based access.
Election night is a good example of why that distinction matters. Broadcasters need infrastructure that can reliably support the broadcast without requiring teams to procure, configure, secure, and maintain all of the hardware and networking behind it themselves.
For me, that comes down to three areas: infrastructure, security, and speed.
One of the biggest differences between cloud and on-premise production is what the broadcaster has to own and maintain.
An on-premise deployment requires hardware to be purchased and installed, along with the networking required to connect it to the rest of the production environment. That infrastructure then has to be supported throughout its lifecycle, whether the broadcaster is actively using it for an election or waiting for the next one.
Cloud-native production removes much of that physical infrastructure from the equation.
For a broadcast team, this is less about handling a dramatic increase in user traffic on election night. The number of people operating the election system remains relatively small regardless of how many viewers are watching the broadcast.
The advantage is that the broadcaster doesn't need to maintain dedicated infrastructure and internal teams simply to ensure those users have access to the system when they need it.
That equation changes when election data is also being delivered through digital products. A broadcaster's website or interactive election app can experience significant swings in traffic as polls close and audience interest peaks. In that environment, cloud resource elasticity becomes particularly useful because resources can scale with demand rather than requiring permanent infrastructure sized for the highest possible traffic.
For 7NEWS in Australia, the "Screen of Dreams" digital widget allows audiences to interact directly with election results on their website. That kind of public-facing experience is where auto-scaling can help manage changing traffic efficiently and cost effectively.
For the broadcast workflow itself, the value of the cloud is more operational: less hardware and software to procure, less infrastructure to set up and maintain, and fewer dependencies for the broadcaster's technical team to manage.
Election coverage attracts an unusual level of attention, and broadcasters have to think carefully about the security of the systems supporting it.
SVT's requirements for Sweden's 2022 election are a useful example. The election took place during a period of heightened concern about cybersecurity and foreign interference, and SVT had particularly stringent requirements for the environment running its election software.
The solution for that election included a sandboxed deployment using Docker images with no connection to the public internet. It was a specific response to SVT's security requirements at the time.
As more broadcast infrastructure moves to the cloud, enterprise platforms such as Microsoft Azure provide another model for managing many of those underlying infrastructure requirements.
For broadcasters, there are several practical advantages:
InterKnowlogy has worked within the Microsoft ecosystem throughout our history, and IK Election Insights is built on Microsoft Azure. That gives us an enterprise cloud foundation underneath the election-specific data and visualization capabilities we build for broadcasters.
Moving production to the cloud doesn't remove the broadcaster's security responsibilities, but it does change how those responsibilities are divided and risks mitigated. Broadcasters still need appropriate governance and access controls, while the cloud provider and IK can take responsibility for much more of the infrastructure, monitoring, patching, and support underneath the application.
For broadcast operations teams, that means fewer infrastructure concerns competing for attention as they prepare for the election.
Election systems have traditionally required a significant amount of preparation before they ever reach the studio.
Preparing a traditional election system can involve procuring and installing hardware, configuring the network and software, integrating data sources, and then leaving enough time to test and rehearse the complete workflow.
Cloud-native platforms remove hardware procurement and much of the associated infrastructure setup from that process. There is no need to wait for servers to arrive before the software environment can be prepared.
We've also seen the product model change. Instead of requiring extensive custom development for every deployment, more of the platform can be configured around the broadcaster's requirements. That allows teams to spend less time rebuilding foundational capabilities and more time adapting the experience to the election they are covering.
IK Election Insights, for example, can be broadcast-ready in as little as four weeks.
A code change in IK Election Insights automatically triggers tests and deployment through a CI/CD pipeline and gets deployed to the Cloud automatically. This also ensures that any emergency fixes on election night can be speedily deployed.
Usually, the Application version moves from Dev to Staging to Production system. You Build in Dev, Test in Staging and Release to Production. In a cloud native application, these environments can be created consistently using automated infrastructure definitions.
Cloud native applications make it easier to deploy consistently to Dev, Staging, and Production, once the deployment automation is set up.
Teams still need to validate data, configure graphics, test workflows, and rehearse how the platform will be used once results begin coming in.
Reducing the infrastructure work involved in getting the platform running gives broadcasters more time to focus on how they want to use the data once election night begins.
When election-night infrastructure is doing its job, the audience's attention stays on the results, the races that are changing, and the questions anchors are trying to answer.
That's why I think the distinction between cloud-hosted and cloud-native is worth understanding.
For the broadcast workflow, the case for cloud-native infrastructure isn't primarily about scaling resources to accommodate millions of viewers. It's about removing much of the hardware, networking, maintenance, monitoring, and security work that broadcasters would otherwise have to manage themselves.
For digital election experiences, the equation expands. When audience traffic can rise sharply as results begin coming in, cloud infrastructure can scale resources with that demand without requiring permanent capacity, sized just right for election-night peaks without unnecessary costs.
Both ultimately give broadcasters a more flexible infrastructure model, but they solve different problems.
It also supports the kind of election storytelling broadcasters need. Giving anchors the ability to explore changing results, move through the reporting timeline, or test different scenarios depends on the infrastructure underneath those tools being able to process the data quickly and reliably.
Audiences shouldn't have to think about the infrastructure underneath the broadcast. They should be able to follow what is happening, understand why the picture is changing, and trust that the information on screen is keeping pace with the count.
Explore how broadcasters bring election nights to life with IK Election Insights, InterKnowlogy's cloud-native election graphics platform.
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