Lawo Supports AES67 Interoperability Demo During AES

At the 139th Audio Engineering Society Convention in New York City, the recently formed Media Networking Alliance (MNA) held its first public display of audio networking based on the new AES67 interoperability standard. The demonstration showed interconnectivity between 22 currently available products from 18 different companies, all streaming live audio over the same network via AES67.

AES67 specific extensions to the different network platforms utilized by each manufacturer provided for the common interchange of digital audio between an array of products. Lawo provided its RAVENNA-based equipment including its sapphire compact broadcast mixing console, JADE Studio software application, and the new A__mic8 analog-to-IP interface.

AES67 supports both unicast (one-to-one) and multicast (one-to-many) audio transmission. The technology on display was primarily a multicast configuration and allowed visitors to see how some of the manufacturer-specific discovery, control and monitoring functions can augment AES67 audio interoperability and coexist on the same network. Digital audio signals were seamlessly interchanged between devices from ALC NetworX, Archwave AG, Axia Audio, Digigram, DirectOut, Focusrite, Genelec, Lawo, Merging Technologies, QSC, Solid State Logic, Telos Systems and Yamaha. All devices were connected to a standard network through a single Ethernet switch and appeared as available sources for monitoring on Lawo’s sapphire compact console.

“From a very early stage, Lawo has been a strong supporter of an open industry-wide standard for audio routing and management within IP networks. The Media Networking Alliance represents an excellent opportunity to achieve a practical, industry-wide implementation of AES67,” states Andreas Hilmer, Lawo’s Marketing Director and Member of the Board of the MNA. “In order to support the transition to IP-based infrastructures, we encourage all manufacturers to come together and embrace interoperability and open standards as the best solution for our mutual customers. Lawo is committed to this goal and we are fully supporting the MNA initiative with the adoption and implementation of AES67 across our full product range.”