Sky News Arabia shortlisted for IBC 2012 Innovation Award

‘We’re delighted that IBC has recognised the technical innovation, expertise and hard work that went into the launch of Sky News Arabia,’ said David Phillips, managing director of TSL, the systems integrator behind the project. ‘It’s a very commendable and highly successful project and we’re glad to hear that it has been shortlisted for this prestigious award.’

Sky News Arabia offers 24/7 news coverage in Arabic to the Middle East. It is transmitted in both SD and HD with content available online, on tablets and on smartphones. As a start-up, its production facilities represent the state of the art in television and online news, and building its new centre was one of the largest projects undertaken in the region.

Amongst other cutting-edge elements, the facility uses a modified universal bookings system by automating the scheduling and QC of all input/output circuit bookings across Sky News Arabia’s control room. As all of the station's content transfers over IP, TSL had to design a very solid IP infrastructure, while achieving broadcast standards of reliability, and allowing priorities to be set for traffic close to air time.  

While the infrastructure is firmly file-based with as much emphasis on connection to social media as to ingest, the centre itself still has to operate as a highly pressurised broadcast centre, and the build, by TSL, features some of the largest monitor walls ever constructed in a broadcast station.

www.tsl.co.uk