As of May 2020, Trickbox TV is officially 10 years old. The company provides multi-camera solutions for a variety of broadcast projects and hosts its own central London studio overlooking Tower Bridge. Experienced in live streaming, they have recently branched out with a successful Virtual Events service.

Reflecting on the decade, Trickbox’s Founder and Managing Director, Liam Laminman, commented, ‘Trickbox has had an eventful life so far. From our beginnings in the wake of the financial crisis to celebrating our tenth anniversary during a global pandemic, we’ve adapted to the challenges that have come our way. Trickbox’s successes have been in the experiences we’ve gained by working on many different projects and alongside an amazing team. We’ve built a strong network of clients and suppliers and we’re looking forward to the new decade and the opportunities yet to come.’

Trickbox TV has worked on projects with many big industry names; BBC, ITV, Sky, Netflix, Vodaphone, The Financial Times and Oracle.

Bubble Agency, the global PR, marketing and events specialist for the media and entertainment technology and services sectors, today announced the appointment of Melanie Webb, as a PR and marketing consultant. Melanie brings to Bubble over 15 years of experience working in the production and distribution end of the broadcast sector at agencies including Premier PR and Franklin Rae.

Melanie has held various positions within production, including TV producer, further exemplifying her strong expertise in managing and delivering corporate publicity for TV, film, media companies and brands, as well as consumer programme publicity for a range of broadcasters, independent production companies, distributors and content providers. Her client experience includes: Rough Cut, A&E Networks, Edinburgh TV Festival, Independent Films, Women in Film & Television Awards, DRG and more.

CJP Broadcast announces a new addition to its range of products and services with the introduction of a fully integrated transportable live sports production system. Comprising the Streamstar production unit, InPlayer video-on-demand paywall and JW Player streaming service, it provides the core resources needed to create complete programmes for live streaming or VOD distribution.

Available in several versions supporting up to eight camera inputs, the system can ISO-record multiple source feeds simultaneously, plus the live output stream, to a 1 terabyte internal SSD for live mixing or offline postproduction. It is intended for use with a combination of unmanned remote-control broadcast HD pan/tilt/zoom cameras, goal cameras and traditional-style manned ENG tripod-mountable cameras, wireless drone cameras or auxiliary sources such as Skype-TX-connected guests.

Anevia announces the addition of multi-tiered storage to its Cloud DVR storage offering, Embedded Distributed Storage (EDS). This new feature makes EDS even more cost-efficient and scalable while also enabling storage in the cloud – meaning the solution becomes both flexible and elastic.

TV service providers are increasingly enriching their VOD content and need to expand their storage capacity without a commensurate increase in the number of users. The original hyper-convergent design of the scalable, high-performance EDS calls for more servers to be added to increase streaming and storage capacity in parallel. Multi-tiered storage means it is now possible to also increase storage capacity independently of streaming capacity.

With only a small fraction of the VOD catalogue being consumed regularly, long-tail content can be stored more efficiently and cost-effectively on general-purpose ‘cold storage’ support used by the IT departments. This eliminates the need to buy new servers and the related software licences, cutting both the complexity and the cost of scaling for a given number of users.

The newly introduced feature also enables object storage, which opens up the possibility of storing in the public or private cloud. This brings the advantages of scalability, flexibility and elasticity.

Cinegy, the global leader for broadcast playout software in the cloud has announced a new partnership with New Hampshire-based US Broadcast, a broadcast distributor that uses its channel marketing and technical skill sets to tailor sales for the North American market.

US Broadcast CTO Eric Pratt said, "US Broadcast is currently busy aiding resellers and customers with the technical challenges of connecting video and audio workflows, using our expertise in IP video and remote production to solve their problems. Lately, we’ve had an increase in enquiries with customers looking for help bridging the distance between contributors and production and we’re finding Cinegy’s software-based solutions are particularly relevant at this time.”

IHSE, the leading manufacturer of high-end KVM (keyboard-video-mouse) solutions for extension and switching of computer signals, today announced that Al-Mamlaka TV, Jordan's first state-funded public service news broadcaster, has adopted IHSE KVM solutions for its all-new, state-of-the-art broadcast facility in the capital city of Amman.

Launched in 2018, Al-Mamlaka TV operates from a greenfield, futuristic new broadcasting center in Amman, with a 24/7 lineup of HD news and public affairs shows airing on both linear and OTT platforms. Al-Mamlaka TV worked with an IHSE systems integrator to design the landmark broadcast center, which boasts several firsts in the region: one of the first facilities to embrace virtualization, one of the first to feature a motorized video wall, and the first to make extensive use of augmented reality (AR). The centerpiece of the Al-Mamlaka TV facility is a 400-square-meter, seven-camera studio with five sets and an open design connecting it to the newsroom one floor below. A second, four-camera studio features three predesigned sets, and a third smaller studio looks out on an impressive view of the Amman skyline.

On the back of their recent announcement of the new Integrated Services Monitoring (ISM) model, Bridge Technologies has demonstrated the value and robustness of their approach with technology collaborators Appear, in a setup which facilitates end-to-end delivery and monitoring of data, uncompressed to compressed, from production to end user.

ISM seeks to bring together the Bridge Technologies portfolio of products into a turnkey, easy-to-install media monitoring system.

It represents Bridge’s recognition of the increasingly merged and hybridized nature of the industry, where single entities may now operate on multiple layers of the broadcast and media cycle; from production through signal acquisition, contribution streams, picture archiving, OTT/streaming media, to traditional broadcast distribution with DTT or Satellite.

The advanced IP-based production and distribution setup – which would have also been demoed at NAB this year – is a successfully tested proof of concept for a full-length monitoring solution from production to end user, using standards SDI, SPTS, MPTS and OTT. The setup has been fully tested with four cameras with SDI outputs feeding an IP network processor to seamlessly bridge SDI and IP networks.

Nevion, award-winning provider of virtualized media production solutions, announced today that TV 2, the largest commercial television broadcaster in Norway, is using Nevion’s Service Operations Center (SOC) to provide proactive support and monitoring of its IP media network operations.

Having moved to IP production in 2017 with Nevion’s help, TV 2 initially chose Nevion’s advanced remote services, in order to leverage the expertise and experience of the SOC’s staff, and focus on its own core-competencies, including content creation. When the COVID-19 crisis developed, TV 2’s decision to virtualize the support and monitoring of its IP media network operations proved to be invaluable as very few staff would have been able to be on-site to maintain the network.

Kieran Phillips, Sales & Service Coordinator at CJP Broadcast, will be live broadcasting his sponsored head shave on Tuesday April 28th to support St Michael's Hospice in Hereford. This will be accessible at https://youtu.be/utwavyouVFs and shared across social media. Donations are invited via https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/kieran-phillips4.

"We know how important the services provided by St Michael's are," Kieran comments. "They include a wide range of nursing, social and spiritual care for home-based and hospice-based patients, guidance and counselling for families, and practical resources for healthcare professionals. The Covid-19 pandemic has reduced the level of financial support many important charities are receiving at a time when they need that income more than ever. This sponsored head shave is one way in which we can try to offset the impact of the virus. We will also be working in conjunction with Luke Sutton Productions to make a promotional video for St. Michael's."

"Organisations such as St Michael's Hospice that totally rely on donations and fundraising are desperately in need of support to be able to continue their incredible work throughout and beyond this awful crisis," adds CJP Broadcast's Managing Director Chris Phillips. "We hope that our small contribution raises awareness of the work these compassionate and caring healthcare professionals provide to people and their families.”

SES announced today that the number of global TV households it reaches directly or indirectly via satellite increased by 12 million to 367 million in 2019. Findings from the company's annual Satellite Monitor market research validate, once again, SES's position as the world's leading video content distributor via satellite and shows the important role that satellite continues to play in reaching the largest possible audience globally.

Much of the increase in the 12 million TV households is attributed to the leading infrastructure of TV reception — satellite and cable — which grew by 9 million in 2019 to 153 million and 149 million homes, respectively. Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) and terrestrial TV grew by a combined 3 million to 43 million and 21 million homes.

The Satellite Monitor study also showed that SES's technical reach has increased across several continents, including Europe, Africa, Asia-Pacific (APAC), and Latin America (LATAM). Europe continues to be the strongest market for SES, with 168 million total households served by the SES fleet, up by 1 million from 2018, followed by North America at 69 million.