Nevion Launches New Baseband to IP Converter Products

Nevion announced the launch of a series of baseband to IP converters in the Flashlink product family, as part of an updated strategy for the company’s baseband broadcast infrastructure offering. The strategy is focused on assisting broadcast organizations making the smooth, incremental transition from baseband to IP.

IP technology is making rapid in-roads in the live production landscape and in recent months, Nevion has seen the number of projects involving IP grow dramatically. The company has completed its best first quarter ever, with IP-related sales showing a multi-double digit year-on-year sales growth. Furthermore, Nevion estimates that the tipping point for shifting from centralized baseband modular routing to IP distributed routing is approximately 30% of ports going IP, meaning the momentum is firmly there.

“We have invested heavily in bringing IP technology to the market, but baseband is not dead, far from it,” explains Geir Bryn-Jensen, CEO of Nevion. “There is a lot of baseband equipment out there that won’t be replaced anytime soon. We at Nevion want to concentrate on what we believe is the key future growth area in baseband, which is connecting the remaining baseband equipment together and to the growing IP core network.”

Nevion’s updated baseband strategy will focus on three main areas:

• Compact hybrid intelligent routers, such as Nevion’s VikinX Sublime X2, to route signals around baseband islands.
• Fiber transport technology like the Flashlink product family, which is able to carry not only baseband but also IP payloads between studios and in outside broadcasts.
• Products capable of bridging the baseband and IP world, such as those Flashlink cards.

At NAB, Nevion will be showcasing new Flashlink cards that provide signal conversion from baseband to IP, with CWDM and DWDM interfaces. The 3G-IP-MUX-8 is a VSF TR-04 compliant video-over-IP converter, with 8 direction-configurable ports and PTP compliant synch over IP. The AES-IP-MUX and ADA-IP-MUX are AES 67 and TR-04 compliant digital-audio-over-IP and analog/digital-audio-over-IP respectively. These new products enable baseband equipment to be connected to an IP core network, as part of an incremental migration to an all IP infrastructure.

The product launches form part of Nevion’s overarching theme at NAB to demonstrate the value of interoperability, the use of open standards, and how the company’s portfolio of solutions can be used in the transition to IP. At Nevion’s booth — SU5510 in the upper South Hall — the products from the Flashlink and VikinX families will be shown interacting with an IP core network featuring third-party COTS (commercial off the shelf) switches.