Trilogy Communications Ltd gets another VOTE of confidence

Trilogy Communications, a world leader in broadcast intercom has been chosen once again by the BBC to provide communications for the much anticipated 2010 UK general election. It will be the latest milestone in a 13 year relationship with other recent successes including the 2008 US Presidential and 2009 European Parliamentary and UK County Council elections.

With a 10 strong team of presenters including David Dimbleby, Jeremy Paxman and Fiona Bruce this year’s election coverage promises to be as complex as ever. Despite the obvious challenges recent rehearsals went without incident and the team is now fine tuning the numerous systems required to work seamlessly on the night. These include what is now a vast communications system which stretches from over twenty BBC English Regions which have Commander systems to the expansive News system at Television Centre and then onward to Millbank studios.

In total 10 Commander communications systems will be interconnected with several smaller Orator systems and a number of Trilogy’s proven IP based Mercury intercoms. The majority of the equipment is in regular use by news teams although two, of the 192 port, Commander systems and over eighty 16 and 24 key control panels will be rented from Trilogy for the duration of the election. Much of this rented equipment will be located in the massive TC1 studio where it will serve fifty operator positions occupied by producers, graphics, analysts, editors and the results team.

Key amongst the roles of the communications system on election night is to keep the presenters up to date through their ear pieces as the election proceeds. The system brings in information from hundreds of external lines and serves it up to a range people including ‘Stringer Producers', who manage the results as they are declared, psephologists who are looking for trends and predictions in the results and graphics artists who prepare the on-screen graphics that presenters such as Jeremy Vine are famous for.

One of the critical elements of this process is that it is in real time, this becomes crucial in election coverage where results are coming in second by second, this is especially so when following the race to be the first constituency to declare which has, for the last 4 elections, been won by Sunderland.

Mercury IP systems are being used extensively to link studio activities in London and Manchester.

Trilogy’s range of intercom equipment is well known for delivering robust, highest quality communications and has built up an enviable reputation within the broadcast industry. Indeed these Trilogy systems have been facilitating election programming since 1999 when BBC News were initially equipped with 10 Commander systems deployed throughout the various News facilities in Television Centre. This system carries out all of the communications functions of the BBC’s whole news operation during everyday operation and is then only supplemented during elections.

Background Information

Trilogy has supplied intercom communications equipment to customers in more than seventy countries since 1986. The company was originally formed to design and build video and audio infrastructure equipment for the television and radio broadcast market. It continues to serve this market but now also offers its products to a wide array of customers in defence, emergency management and training and simulation industries.

Trilogy counts some of the world's best known names among its customer base. These include BBC, ITV, CBS, Fox TV, Al Jazeera, Radio France, Arqiva, Star TV, Times TV, Qatar TV, Reuters and many others.