Harmonic’s $274 million acquisition of media server and storage specialist Omneon suggests that the market is ready to resume consolidating – and that Harmonic is likely to continue being part of that consolidation.

The Harmonic-Omneon deal is likely to be prelude to further deals in the industry as well, according to Strategy Analytics/D.I.S.

The consulting group said the deal confirms its forecast that the recovery in the professional media industry is underway. Strategy Analytics’ report, “Harmonic Acquires Omneon: Impact, Challenges and Next Steps,” also concludes that further deals should be expected from Harmonic as it seeks to add further capabilities.

“Regardless of Harmonic’s clear leadership position in encoding, they could have still been viewed pretty narrowly as a solutions provider for only a relatively small slice of the broadcast and professional workflow,” said Douglas I. Sheer, chief analyst at D.I.S. Consulting.

“With the addition of Omneon,” Sheer continued, “they are able to greatly broaden their solutions offerings in a very – no pun intended – harmonious way, that builds on their already established strengths in the post-production part of their customers’ operations.”

That Harmonic might continue to grow through acquisition isn’t a very risky prediction – that’s what it’s been doing all along. Harmonic recently bought Scopus Video Networks at the end of 2008 and Rhozet in 2007.