44 ADVERTISEMENT FEATURE Red Bee Media
Red Bee Media has an ambition to be a ‘glass to glass’ service provider focused on delivering a premium consumer experience. This is why, as the company explains, it is investing in and investigating technology for remote production HIGH-EFFICIENCY PRODUCTION
ince 2016, Red Bee Media has undergone a technology transition and has evolved its traditional SDI and hardware- based facilities into IP and software- defined systems. Through this evolution, and with the deployment of its hybrid cloud platform, Red Bee Media now has a platform on which to deploy new, next- generation production technologies. Whilst not currently available from the traditional big-name vendors, the Ericsson-owned company has a vision to deploy software- based production systems within this environment, with the possibility to deploy multiple concurrent instances on the same platform with agreed pay-as-you-consume rates with its selected partners. “Throughout this technology journey Red Bee Media has partnered with not just traditional hardware and software vendors, but also next-generation industry vendors,” explains Chris Pearman, Red Bee Media’s head of remote production strategy and architecture. “The company has worked with our vision to offer innovative, flexible
platforms and models which are allowing purely consumption-based production. As a result, it will reduce the total cost of ownership for our customers.” In recognition that these technologies are evolving at a rapid pace, Red Bee Media says it has built its base architecture around a high throughput, high-availability COTS platform. This allows the company to validate the currently available software- only production systems and also to bring into this environment, production software from other vendors once those vendors come to market with commercially deployable systems. RED LAB To enable continuous test, development and deployment of evolving software, the company uses its ‘Red Lab’ R&D facilities which recently opened in the UK and The Netherlands, with another one on the way in Sweden. Each Red Lab includes a workspace where Red Bee Media collaborates with technology partners to test, at a rapid rate, new software and,
where there is an operational requirement, move this into a live production environment. Pearman says Red Bee Media believes the move into high-efficiency production is achievable now that highly functional software production environments are coming of age within the broadcast and events space. “This move allows new models of operation, such as truly allowing operators to work in geographically diverse locations from each other,” he asserts. “Although this is fully dependent on connectivity, this is becoming much less of an issue than say 12 to 18 months ago. “This step change in production environment is different from the ‘traditional’ operational methods of today and will, within a very short period of time, become the norm. Not only can businesses realise financial overheads on large-ticket production assets but, once the green- credentials and staff utilisation models are understood further, it will become clear that this kind of production operating model will fulfil both of these requirements too.” together effectively when working in a high-efficiency operating model is the availability of both visual and audible collaboration platforms. Today this is typically done through use of both traditional broadcast talkback systems and also commodity-standard IT platforms offering visual collaboration; such as webcam environments of Skype for Business group video sessions. A key enabler to ensuring that production staff are able to work
RED BEE MEDIA CAN OFFER CUSTOMERS CUTTING-EDGE PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY SOLUTIONS ENABLING THEM TO PRODUCE CUTTING-EDGE CONTENT
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