FrankSpeech:From Outages to On-Air
How Pidoxa rebuilt FrankSpeech's platform from the ground up and gave them the infrastructure to grow.
- Custom development
- Infrastructure
- Monitoring & incident response
- Transition management
Client background
FrankSpeech is a conservative media platform serving news consumers who feel underserved by mainstream outlets. The platform is built on an America-first editorial approach, giving voice to content creators who might otherwise face suppression or deplatforming, and delivering coverage that major media networks often don't surface.
- Scale the platform to support a growing audience without outages or performance issues.
- Launch a mobile app to expand reach beyond desktop users.
- Add multi-channel livestreaming capability and expanded OTT support (Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV Stick).
- Modernize the tech stack to enable faster feature development.
- Bring transparency and accountability to infrastructure security and uptime.
A platform that became a ceiling
When FrankSpeech came to Pidoxa, they were running on an aging Drupal CMS that had become a ceiling rather than a foundation. Their growth had outpaced the platform's capacity, and unexplained outages were eroding both revenue and audience trust. The existing vendor couldn't provide satisfactory answers about what was going wrong or how to fix it.
The status quo was unsustainable. Without intervention, FrankSpeech would have continued to lose revenue due to outages, been unable to support high-traffic events, and remained locked out of new platform features. The lack of visibility into infrastructure security was also a growing liability.
A rebuild from the ground up
Pidoxa took a ground-up approach, replacing the Drupal foundation with a purpose-built app stack while simultaneously taking over infrastructure management. Rather than patching around existing limitations, we built systems FrankSpeech could actually grow into, including developing our own video transcoding solution when third-party options proved unreliable.
- Audited and documented all existing infrastructure: IPs, machine roles, usernames, and procedures to confirm what was current and correct what wasn’t
- Built a full app stack, including databases, caching, load balancing, an admin portal, and user authentication (email and social login)
- Established documented operational checklists to ensure continued reliability
- Migrated existing content from the Drupal database and imported video assets from S3
- Developed a custom website for managing and displaying creator channels, videos, and articles
- Built a custom mobile app with clean API integration, eliminating the need to convert legacy Drupal data
- Updated the OTT app to the same API architecture
- Replaced an unreliable cloud-based transcoder with a proprietary in-house solution capable of handling VOD in multiple resolutions across desktop, tablet, and mobile, converting an ongoing operating expense into a capital investment for the client
- Added multi-channel livestreaming support
2.0 live in six months
Infrastructure takeover was completed within the first month. The 2.0 platform launched approximately six months after engagement began.
Purpose-built 2.0 platform
A new app stack and custom website for creator channels, videos, and articles, replacing the Drupal CMS.
Mobile and OTT apps
A custom mobile app and an updated OTT app for Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV Stick, on one API architecture.
In-house transcoding and livestreaming
A proprietary VOD transcoder in multiple resolutions, plus multi-channel livestreaming support.
Stable, scalable, accountable
FrankSpeech gained a stable, scalable foundation with a development team behind it, replacing a single-developer dependency.
- ✔Downtime decreased significantly; incidents that did occur were accompanied by root cause analysis and documented prevention plans.
- ✔The platform gained the ability to support large-scale livestream events without service disruption.
- ✔New features could be scoped and deployed through a structured ideation and development process, rather than being bottlenecked by legacy CMS limitations.
- ✔A custom mobile app extended the platform’s reach to mobile audiences for the first time.
- ✔Infrastructure and security were brought under documented, accountable management.
We didn't treat this as a migration—we treated it as a rebuild with purpose. By taking full ownership of both infrastructure and development, we eliminated the ambiguity that had left FrankSpeech without answers for too long.
When third-party systems introduced new points of failure, we built our own rather than accepting unreliable dependencies. The result is a platform with the transparency, stability, and flexibility to support FrankSpeech's continued growth.
“I can depend upon and trust Pidoxa to always do the right thing for the customer and the customer’s customers.”
“When we approached the Pidoxa team for help, we were spending $650,000/mo on infrastructure and IT staffing with approximately 30 FTEs. We had daily outages and stability issues constantly.
In about a month, we were able to reduce our IT staff to 6 FTEs, and they located and fixed the stability issues. Pidoxa hired/contracted all media and production staff, ordered equipment (microphones, lights, stands, desks, monitors, servers, storage, cameras, tele-prompters, mixing boards, remote equipment). Their producers engaged with our on-air talent and set up branding, lower thirds, and multi-camera HD shots in custom-built studios.
When I visited the office the first time, about 2 weeks post contract execution, I was floored. It reminded me of a massive casualty event where everyone had a job to do, knew how to do it, and wasted no time. No one went home before 8pm, some didn't sleep, and others who did sleep did so in cubicles. It was an all-hands effort, with a team of very highly motivated no-nonsense professionals who turned out a quality multi-faceted product.
I cannot say enough about how they went from zero to 100, which once were empty offices into fully packed studios, production areas, and sets that seemed like overnight. Anyone else would have taken 6-12 months. They did everything necessary to make this happen, including calling in favors, not waiting on slower vendors to deliver equipment, and instead sending couriers. Basically, they didn’t let any blocker derail their efforts, and they beat all expectations and took pride while doing it.”
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