Telecommunications company AirSpeed Telecom, which operates a nationwide licensed wireless radio transmission network, has teamed up with Digital Space to launch Livelinx, a new broadcasting venture that allows organisations deliver live expert commentary straight to newsrooms across the country.
Livelinx saves broadcasters the cost of sending a crew to conduct interviews and reduces satellite uplink fees. Its content is currently being delivered to RTÉ, while UK broadcasters are also interested in the service.
The service has already been installed in Irish stockbroker firms NCB Stockbrokers, Davy and Merrion Stockbrokers to link them to the RTE newsroom. A broadcasting set-up, including camera, audio feed and dedicated connectivity into, was established inside each participating firm, allowing studio-based presenters to remotely interview the financial experts on the day’s markets news.
The captured audio and video from the remote site is encoded as MPEG-4 and carried on a high-capacity licensed wireless link using the IP protocol. Each stockbroker location has its own dedicated connection into the AirSpeed Telecom network, where Quality of Service (QoS) is used to protect the broadcast quality of the stream. The content is transmitted to RTÉ and decoded at the broadcaster’s site, where it is fed directly into the newsroom.
Tel: 1890 799 899
+353 1 4287500
E: enquiries@airspeed.ie
W: www.airspeed.ie
“AirSpeed Telecom are short-circuiting the traditional process and travel and uplink costs by putting a remote camera into business locations, fully automated with a pre-set shot and audio capability. The remote camera acts exactly as if it’s a studio camera and the interviewee just clips on the mic to begin the interview,” says Liam O’Kelly, managing director, AirSpeed Telecom.
“Broadcasters will not use a service like Livelinx unless there are cast-iron protections against jitter and latency on the network. Livelinx has been engineered to keep the streams continuously protected, with uncontended point-to-point licensed wireless links as the carrier network.
“The broadcasters are very impressed with what this technology has proven it can do. The applications are exciting and Irish organisations really do have the chance to make their expertise available to broadcasters anywhere.”
Deirdre Nolan
