NAB Perspectives: Genelec’s Eggleston Sees More Focus on Audio Monitoring in Remote Trucks

Audio mixers heard things a bit better in 2011, and that’s carrying over into 2012, says Will Eggleston, director of marketing for speaker manufacturer Genelec.

“We saw an improving trend in terms of sales of smaller systems into broadcast last year, which we believe translates into installations in outside-broadcast trucks,” he says. “That same [sales] trend has extended into 2012, so we expect to see ongoing improvement in remote monitoring for sports broadcast.”

He notes that the trend also appears to extend into Europe, where Genelec has seen increased sales of its smaller, 8020A and 8030A models as well as its DSP.SE self-calibration systems designed for small environments, such as trucks.

The sale of certain types of mounting hardware also reinforce his appraisal of the trend. “These are not inexpensive systems, so, when you see multiple systems being installed regularly, it’s an indication that a serious investment is being made.”

That’s driven in part, he continues, by a need within the broadcast industry for some kind of standardization of monitoring in truck environments. It underscores a larger migration of higher-level monitoring from studios to trucks and other remote and temporary locations.

Eggleston also sees increased activity among truck builders working on remote vehicles for colleges and universities. “That’s another area [in which] we expect to see growth and demand for an improvement in monitoring quality.”

At the NAB Show, Genelec released updates for its DSP systems: v.1.4.2 for the GLM system, making it Lion OS-compliant (OS X 10.7) for Apple computers, and v.1.3.1 for GLM.SE systems. Both systems are compatible for Windows 7.