IBC2008: Harris Sends Up New Transmitter Line
Harris Broadcast Communications targets European DTV business.
By Glen Dickson -- Broadcasting & Cable, 9/11/2008 6:55:00 PM
IBC2008 represents something of a blast from the past for Harris Broadcast Communications, as the company’s largest product introduction is a new line of UHF television transmitters it is aiming at European TV stations and other international broadcasters that have yet to migrate to digital-terrestrial transmission.
Harris spent the past four years making a series of acquisitions that transformed it from a transmission-focused supplier to a broadcast-equipment conglomerate with a wide range of production, storage, playout and automation systems.
As president Tim Thorsteinson noted at the company’s IBC2008 press event, the all-in-one strategy has largely been successful, as Harris Broadcast grew its annual revenues from $200 million in 2004 to $650 million for fiscal-year 2008, which ended in June.
But with the EMEA (Europe/Middle East/Africa) region ripe for a bevy of digital-TV conversions, Harris is going back to its roots, unveiling the Maxiva family of liquid-cooled TV transmitters for high-power UHF broadcasting and air-cooled solid-state units for low-power UHF transmissions.
The new transmitters, designed to make Harris more price-competitive in Europe, will use Harris’ “PowerSmart” architecture, a power-amplification technique based on chip technology from Freescale Semiconductor. Harris said PowerSmart enables the Maxiva line to deliver the same effective power in one-half the rack space and requires about one-half the electricity to run compared to previous transmitters.
“Transmission and excitement don’t usually go in the same sentence, though come to think of it, we do sell exciters,” quipped Thorsteinson. “But this is probably the most exciting lineup of transmission products we’ve had in 10-15 years.”
While Harris’ sales in the U.S. were flat for 2008, Thorsteinson added, international sales were strong, with revenue growth for the rest of the world in the 15%-20% range. The Middle East drew most of the growth for the EMEA region, with large HD system sales to deep-pocketed customers like Abu Dhabi Media.
That trend should continue, along with new growth in the transmitter segment, predicted Richard Scott, vice president and general manager of EMEA for Harris. There is a $4.8 billion market for digital-television equipment overall in EMEA, he added, saying 45% of the installed transmitter base is more than 15 years old and fewer than 25% have converted to digital.
Harris announced several new sales to European broadcasters of large playout systems based on its Nexio AMP (advanced media platform) server, with the most significant being a new digital-playout center for German broadcaster ProSiebenSat.1 which should be completed next March. The Munich facility is getting 34 Nexio servers for recording, quality control and playout; five Velocity ESX storage-area-network HD/SD editing systems; and ADC automation software, along with project support, training and commissioning from Harris.
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