VRT

Visualizing the future of radio and television

VRT is the public broadcasting network that provides radio and television for the Flemish Community. VRT's mission is to play a leading role in the areas of information, recreation, education and culture.

The network also aims to lead in the field of innovation.

Like all media companies in the world, VRT faces daunting challenges when it looks at the future of its industry. The combination of new technologies and economic pressures will raise the stakes for making the right business decisions, and avoiding the wrong ones.

In order to remain competitive, VRT knew it needed to develop and implement a comprehensive strategy that embraced new media forms and new devices, as well as the integration of media such as TV, radio and internet. To stimulate its creative workforce, VRT decided to design and build a modern, integrated and efficient media production platform, replacing the traditional tape-based workflow organization with a completely new file-based workflow organization, starting from capturing content (ingest) to broadcasting (playout).

IBM Global Business Services consultants helped VRT develop a 'Digital Media Factory'. They built the architecture for the production facilities, worked with VRT on the online content management and implemented the central media asset management system. They also integrated the work centers for the different steps in the production process.

This ambitious project enabled VRT to convert all of its material into a completely tape-free and file-based system.

By creating a central media hub, VRT was able to achieve its goal of enabling media production and editorial staff to collaborate and access a complete range of media material from their workstation.

The addition of an Enterprise Service Bus allowed the media company to integrate TV, radio and online as well as the taxonomy and editing work centers - and become a faster, more efficient, and most importantly, a more fast-forward provider.

The innovation and technical challenges required to develop and implement VRT's solution required a multi-disciplinary team. IBM Global Business Services consultants involved on the project included media and entertainment specialists who worked with the clients to envision the future of media and how to gear up for it; project managers who outlined specific team goals, managed the team and the workflow; senior IT architects who created and designed the 'Digital Media Factory' concept; and applications architects who selected and created the software and platforms.