BCE & RTL Group Building IP Based Production Systems
The Customer
Located in Luxembourg, Broadcasting Center Europe (BCE) is a major European Broadcast, Telecom, ISP and IT service provider that offers technical services to more than 400 clients in, for example, TV, radio, telecommunications and IT, in more than 15 countries. BCE's parent company, the RTL Group, is the leading European entertainment network, with interests in 60 TV channels and 31 radio stations across ten countries. A large number of well-known television channels have selected BCE as their technical partner for program broadcasting, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Clients include RTL Télé Lëtzebuerg, Chamber TV (Luxembourg), RTL TVI, Club RTL, Plug TV (Belgium), RTL4, RTL5, RTL7, RTL8 (Netherlands), RTL9 and AB Groupe movie channels (France).
The Challenge
TL Group is to consolidate all of its operations at its new headquarters: "RTL City" in Luxembourg, including large television and radio studios. The development, dubbed "RTL City," consists of seven buildings. The project to build new premises came around in 2013 when RTL Group needed to invest in more advanced technical equipment. RTL quickly realized that it would require a larger space in which to house the new technology. The building had to be future proof and it also had to be able to support customers and prospects alike for ten years post build, adapting to new workflow challenges as required.
The Grass Valley Solution
The Grass Valley IP routing system combines Kahuna IP production switchers, IP modular SDI to IP and MADI to IP gateways, IQEDGE IP processing systems, IP routing control systems and IP multiviewers providing BCE with a flexible and resilient IP architecture for the future. The initial deployment is based around VSF TR-04 using SMPTE ST 2022-6/7 & AES67 redundant IP streams with a seamless migration to VSF TR-03.