ORS to test 5G broadcast at Danube Island festival

Austrian broadcast transmission provider ORS is to carry out tests of 5G-based live broadcast transmissions from the Danube Island Festival in Vienna this weekend.

In a project funded by the Austrian Television Fund set up by regulator Rundfunk und Telekom Regulierungs (RTR), ORS is testing the suitability of 5G broadcast technology for large events in terms of latency and hybrid distribution. For this purpose, the existing 5G broadcast coverage in Vienna will be specially expanded to ensure reliable signal coverage on the Danube Island during the festival, it said.

The outfit is teaming up with pubcaster ORF and radion staion Kronehit to run a live test at the music festive, transmitting a low-latency live signal from the festival stage to the ORF broadcat centre and then via DCN as well as via 5G broadcast tgramsitter the DC Tower back to the festival site.

Preparations for the test were carried out by ORS with Bitstem in cooperation with Insys VT, using Nakolos middleware on prototype smartphones combined with a low-latency encoding solution from Ateme.

“As a private radio station, we are of course also interested in new broadcasting technologies and have been part of the 5GBC funding project in Vienna for several years. The hybrid distribution of 5G broadcast and broadband is an important step forward in order to make Kronehit available to our listeners on their mobile phones in the highest quality even in the dense crowds of a festival,” said Martin Holovlasky, CTO Kronehit Austria.