LumiCast — Development Story | AMELA Project Portfolio

CLIENT

About the client

LumiCast Japan, one of the country's leading players driving entertainment × live streaming.

LumiCast Japan is a business driving interactive entertainment experiences in Japan's live-streaming market. A platform operator at the forefront of entertainment DX, where smartphone-generation creators and fans connect through 'instantly delivered' live streaming and a gift economy.

The business model is a 'two-way fan economy originating from live streaming.'Streamers go live straight from their devices and monetize through the gift economy, viewers deliver their passion in real time, and operations support thousands of creators × millions of viewers at scale, a new three-stakeholder entertainment platform.

Monthly viewers

1M+

Streaming creator

5,000+

Coverage area

47prefectures

BUSINESS FLOW

Four steps supporting 'stream → watch → pay → operate'

STEP 01

Creator streaming

Start streaming with iOS Native + AR filters + WebRTC, broadcasting straight from the device.

STEP 02

Fan viewing · chat

Sub-3-second latency with the in-house Low-Latency Viewer, real-time two-way communication via Socket.IO.

STEP 03

Gift sending · payment

Server-side point ledgering + multi-channel payments (card / convenience store / carrier billing).

STEP 04

Operations · revenue sharing

Moderation through a Vue.js admin panel, creator payouts via an automated payout workflow.

CHALLENGE

Design challenges to solve

The four structural requirements demanded of the platform.

None of these is a matter of technology choice, but ratherViewer passion · payment experience · brand value · operational scale — a business requirement directly tied to it. A from-scratch build required a design that satisfies them all simultaneously.

Keeping live latency under a second preserves viewer energy and maximizes fan connection

Off-the-shelf video SDKs 5–10 seconds of latency, when a streamer's responses fall out of sync with viewer reactions, the energy cools and fan engagement drops sharply.

Delivering gift effects without delay drives payment-experience friction toward zero

Animations for super chats and high-value gifts when it stutters or lags The 'sense of specialness' breaks down, directly hurting repeat-payment rates and LTV.

Responding instantly to high volumes of reports and inappropriate streams protects the brand of the entire platform

While handling thousands of simultaneous streams,Moderation delays of tens of minutes , inappropriate streams spread and spark backlash on social media, losing the trust of both streamers and viewers all at once.

Automating operations enables scaling to thousands of creators × millions of viewers

Extending manual operations + Excel payouts, Operating costs track business growth linearly, and a flawed design causes profit margins to collapse as scale grows.

ARCHITECTURE

The architecture we built together

Turning the live-streaming experience into an 'unstoppable foundation' across four domains.

Amela designed and built the end-to-end system with iOS Native + WebRTC + RxSwift. Facial landmark detection via Dlib integrated through an Obj-C++ bridge, plus an in-house Low-Latency Viewer module achieving sub-second latency, Stream · watch · pay · operate in an independently scalable form, built in-house from scratch.

EXECUTION

12 months

Duration

96person-months

Total effort

Domain ①

Streaming pipeline

Challenge

Needed to achieve many connections × low latency simultaneously — off-the-shelf SDKs force unavoidable compromises

Solution

WebRTC SFU + RTMP + in-house Low-Latency Viewer

Achieved glass-to-glass latency under 3 seconds with a custom viewing module built in Obj-C++

Domain ②

Real-time two-way

Challenge

Needed to multiplex gift effects + chat + presence notifications within the same streaming room

Solution

Socket.IO room isolation + gift-event broadcast

A dedicated room per stream, delivering chat/effects in under a second via an event-driven model

Domain ③

AR experience (on-device compositing)

Challenge

Needed to run face compositing during live streams while balancing low latency and device battery consumption

Solution

Dlib facial landmarks + OpenCV via an Obj-C++ bridge

A design lightweight enough on-device to run filter compositing every frame

Domain ④

Operations

Challenge

Needed to automate moderation + payouts + revenue sharing in line with operational scale

Solution

Vue.js admin panel + server-side point ledgering + payout workflow

Runs partner verification, report handling, and revenue sharing automatically under centralized management

TECH STACK

FRONTEND

Vue.js ⚡ Vuex

Bootstrap-Vue

Chart.js

MOBILE

Swift

RxSwift ⚡ Alamofire ⚡ SnapKit

STREAMING

WebRTC ▶ HaishinKit (RTMP)

Socket.IO ⚡ Low-Latency Viewer (in-house)

AR / VISION

D Dlib

OpenCV ⚡ Obj-C++ bridge

AUTH

LINE SDK

Twitter Kit

Google Sign-In

Firebase Messaging

BACKEND

Node.js

Aurora MySQL

AWS

IMPACT

The value the platform creates

LumiCast Japan's 'fan economy' accelerates.

This foundation is measured not by technical metrics but byStreaming engagement · payment experience · brand protection · operational scale — continuously generating business outcomes like these.

A foundation supporting an 'instantly delivered' streaming experience

Sub-second latency directly links streamer expression with viewer reactions, making fan connection an everyday reality

A design that maximizes the two-way gift economy

Zero-lag real-time gift effects remove friction from the payment experience, sustainably growing LTV

A foundation that protects the brand through automated operations flows

Centralizing reporting, moderation, and partner approval in a CMS structurally reduces brand-damage risk

A design that scales to thousands × millions

Keeps up with exponential growth in creators × viewers, letting operations focus on what truly improves the fan experience

🎙️

STAKEHOLDER

Streamer

Creators

Generally

Off-the-shelf SDK latency keeps fan interaction distant and constrains expression such as AR filters

At LumiCast Japan,

Sub-second response + AR filters maximize streaming expression, bringing the distance to fans to zero

Business impact

Major boost in streaming engagement + streaming time +40% (general industry metric)

💝

STAKEHOLDER

Viewers · fans

Service users

Generally

Lag in gift effects erodes the sense of specialness, reducing immersion and repeat rates

At LumiCast Japan,

Sub-second gift effects reflect on the streaming screen, making frictionless paid fan interaction an everyday reality

Business impact

Repeat viewing +25% + sustained LTV improvement (general industry metric)

🛡️

STAKEHOLDER

Operations team

Moderation · payouts

Generally

Manual operations + Excel-based payouts can't withstand thousands of creators at scale, ballooning operating costs

At LumiCast Japan,

Centrally managing reporting, moderation, and payouts in a Vue.js CMS structurally shortens response time

Business impact

Moderation response ~4× faster + avoids linear growth in operating costs

🤝

STAKEHOLDER

Music · partners

Rights manager

Generally

The approval flow runs on email / phone and lags, prolonging the wait before streaming can begin

At LumiCast Japan,

A built-in partner-verification workflow makes approval status instantly visible from the CMS

Business impact

Structurally eliminates rights-clearance delays + a healthy streaming ecosystem

Live streaming and the gift economy,Built in-house from scratch.

LumiCast Japan, one of the country's leading players driving entertainment × live streaming.

The four structural requirements demanded of the platform.

Turning the live-streaming experience into an 'unstoppable foundation' across four domains.

LumiCast Japan's 'fan economy' accelerates.

Experience LumiCast with a live, working demo.