Pharos supplies new scheduling system for BBC World Service

Pharos Communications has won the contract to build a new automated scheduling system for BBC World Service.
Routing control will be based at the international broadcaster's London HQ in Bush House. The Pharos-controlled system is IP-based and replaces analogue routing equipment installed in 1982. The system enables a new NTP digital audio router to be accessed and operated via 96 existing control panels in various parts of the building. It also gives each of BBC World Service's 43 language sections the ability to control transmission output using a web browser.
Pharos technical director Spencer Rodd said: "The BBC's analogue system used a proprietary control panel within each studio, showing the time to go to air and the network to be used. Integrating the new system into the existing panels was much more cost-efficient than supplying, installing and configuring 96 new panels. It also eliminated the need to familiarise staff with a new control interface. Software records no longer exist for the previous system so we had to reverse-engineer it, designing a card specifically to communicate with the panels and using XML-to-legacy protocol interfacing."
(GB)