France Televisions taps TVU Networks for hyper-mobile broadcasting

France Televisions has selected live IP technology company TVU Networks to transition its content production workflow from story capture to production to distribution ahead of Paris Olympics 2024. 

The new workflow utilises TVU’s cloud solutions for production, remote collaboration, and IFB, intercom and mix-minus management, the TVU RPS One for synchronised multi-camera live content capture, and 5G networks plus two Starlink Maritime units for transmission and data aggregation.

The French broadcaster utilised hyper-mobile broadcasting for their Paris 2024 one-year countdown talk show on a moving boat. France Televisions used the TVU RPS One and TVU One transmitters, the seven live feeds were synchronised in TVU Producer’s cloud production platform.

The broadcaster also used two Starlink Maritime systems and the 5G network to help counteract the challenges of cellular bandwidth on the moving boats. The TVU RPS One backpack transmitter with 5G modems was used to transmit synchronised signals from multiple cameras to the TVU remote cloud production platform, aggregating 5G and Starlink connectivity.

“We have been able to produce high quality multi-camera live events or breaking news from any location despite challenging circumstances – hardware failures, an entire system down, war zones or deserted areas,” said Romuald Rat, TechLab director at France Télévisions. “With only batteries and cameras in hand and powered by the latest generation of 5G with Starlink and TVU bonded cellular transmission equipment, the reporting team has the tools it needs to rapidly conduct a live newscast anywhere in the world and cover stories from any angle – traditional and new.”

“The live show on July 26th performed flawlessly,” stated Romuald Rat. “Beyond the benefits of enhanced storytelling and flexibility, lies also the important savings made on the technology cost, with the TVU Transmitters powered by Starlink and 5G, combined with the seamless integration of cloud components in the production process, we estimate that we can easily achieve savings of at least 30%, allowing us to produce a lot more content as well as content we could simply not get access to.”

Oliver Martinez, Director of News Production at France Télévisions added,” These savings bring back to the table many productions that were discarded due to high cost or lack of resources. By reducing the onsite requirements of bigger productions and achieving cost savings in travel and set up times, we can leverage the use of internal teams for covering more events and more content for very demanding viewers.”