Thomson's Grass Valley Business Supports Regional Television in New Zealand
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Triangle Television Opens Second Operation in Wellington with Scalable Servers, Infrastructure and IP Communications from Thomson
Paris, France/Nevada City, Calif., February 21, 2007 - As part of its expansion from Auckland to Wellington, New Zealand regional and cultural broadcaster Triangle Television has installed a Grass Valley K2 Media Server and Media Client system, as well as Grass Valley router and infrastructure products from Thomson (Euronext Paris: 18453; NYSE: TMS). The order also included Grass Valley ViBE MPEG-2 encoders to provide two-way contribution circuits over IP between New Zealand's two largest cities.
Triangle Television is New Zealand's first non-commercial, regional TV station and has been broadcasting to the Auckland region since August 1998, in Remuera since March 2004, and on the North Shore from August 2005, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The channel broadcasts on a Government-owned channel and as a public broadcaster, combines access, public service and ethnic television programming into a novel and exciting format.
Triangle Television took the decision to add a Wellington operation earlier this year. The new channel is based around an eight-channel Grass Valley K2 system with storage for 250 hours of content. A multi-layer Grass Valley Triton router and Grass Valley modular products complete the Wellington installation. This configuration will be replicated in Auckland as the original analog, tape-based system is replaced with a K2 system in the near future. As well as the equipment, Grass Valley provided Triangle Television with systems integration support and a continuing service level agreement for the next three years.
After Astral Media in Canada, sterreichischer Rundfunk (ORF) in Austria, Al Jazeera, and TV5, amongst others, Triangle Television is the latest station to adopt Thomson's K2 system, fully compatible for HD and available since Q4 2005.
The two centers, in Wellington and Auckland, are linked for program exchange by IP circuits. Grass Valley MPEG-2 ViBE encoders have been supplied to provide the compression and encoding. ViBE platform allows Triangle Television to migrate to MPEG-4 in the future.
"Triangle Television broadcasts content that reflects the culture of the local communities," said Jim Blackman, Triangle's CEO. "Just after we opened up in Wellington we received congratulations from Steve Maharey, the minister for broadcasting, who said 'Triangle will provide a vibrant new forum for the people of Wellington, and that it will find a special place in the lives of Wellingtonians just as it has with Aucklanders.'"
"As a serious broadcaster, it is vital that we keep up to date with changes in broadcasting technology. We expect our new system - based around the Grass Valley K2 server - will future-proof us for at least the next 10 years and will enable us to continue to provide a high quality audience, as well as the opportunity to expand the number of channels should the need arise," added Blackman.
"It is important for all our users that our products and systems are truly scalable," said Patrick Montliaud, Vice-President worldwide sales, integration & transmission solutions for Grass Valley Business Unit within Thomson. "In Triangle Television we see an extremely popular broadcaster in a smaller market expanding its reach - and benefiting from exactly the same functionality and workflows as larger broadcasters do, by using the same equipment, scaled to their needs and ready to expand as their operations grow."
About Thomson - World leader in digital video technologies
Thomson (Euronext Paris: 18453; NYSE: TMS) provides technology, services, and systems to help its Media & Entertainment clients - content creators, content distributors and users of its technology - realize their business goals and optimize their performance in a rapidly changing technology environment. The Group is the preferred partner to the Media & Entertainment Industries through its Technicolor, Grass Valley, RCA, and Thomson brands. For more information: www.thomson.net.
