Advanced Television

RAI

Blackbird hires Rai as Chief Product Officer

Blackbird, the technology licensor, developer and seller of the cloud native video editing platform, Blackbird, has announced the appointment of Sumit Rai as Chief Product Officer. Sumit will join the Company in June 2022 from VEGAS Creative Software where he holds the same role. Sumit has over 23 years leadership experience in the video and […]

May 12, 2022

Live 5G broadcast for Eurovision Song Contest

Broadcast transmitter and media technologies specialist Rohde & Schwarz and comms technologist Qualcomm Technologies have joined forces with partners in four European countries – CRITS (R&D arm of RAI) in Italy; ORS, in Austria; SWR in Germany and towerCast in France – to deliver live 5G Broadcast/Multicast streaming of the Eurovision Song Contest, taking place […]

May 10, 2022By Colin Mann

Italy: Only Rai sees audience growth in 2021

Rai was the only major Italian broadcaster to register an audience growth in 2021 compared to the previous year, according to data published by the Communications Authority (AgCom). The public broadcaster had an average daily audience share of 36 per cent (+0.8 per cent), ahead of Mediaset with 31.9 per cent (-0.2 per cent), Discovery […]

May 6, 2022From Branislav Pekic in Rome

Tivùsat sees record year; new president

Italian free-to-air digital TV platform, Tivùsat, has reported 507,000 new activations in 2021 – almost double the average of previous years and a new record. With the new additions, the platform closed 2021 with 4.6 million active smart cards. Preliminary data from March 2022 reveals that the number of Tivùsat activations tripled compared to the […]

May 6, 2022From Branislav Pekic in Rome

RAI expands use of Avid Software and Storage

 Avid has announced that multichannel broadcaster Radiotelevisione Italiana (RAI) is making extensive enhancements to optimize the flexibility and scalability of the production workflows serving its five national broadcast channels. The company’s multi-year agreement with Avid extends RAI’s longstanding use of Avid solutions and consists of upgrades to the MediaCentral platform, Media Composer video editing software and the addition of Avid […]

April 14, 2022

Discovery to sublease Olympic FTA rights to RAI

Discovery has reached an agreement with Italian public broadcaster RAI to sublease the TV rights it holds for the Beijing 2022 and Paris 2024 Olympic Games. In June 2015, the US media company paid €1.3 billion for the European TV rights to the Olympics through 2024. According to Italian daily Il Sole 24 Ore, the […]

December 20, 2021From Branislav Pekic in Rome

Alpac Capital takes majority stake in Euronews

Egyptian tycoon Naguib Sawiris has agreed a deal to sell his majority stake in Euronews, the pan-European TV news network, to Portuguese investment firm Alpac Capital. Alpac will acquire the 88 per cent of Euronews’ shares owned by Sawiris’s Luxembourg-based holding Media Globe Networks (MNG) for an undisclosed amount. The deal should be closed by […]

December 20, 2021

Success for EBU content-sharing initiative

A pioneering European news service supported by 11 national broadcasters has garnered more than 23.5 million views in just five months. Launched in July 2021, the ‘A European Perspective’ initiative responds to surging demand for trusted news against the backdrop of conspiracy-fuelled disinformation campaigns and populist rhetoric. It is hosted by public service media from […]

December 8, 2021By Colin Mann

Italy: Tivùsat reaches 4.4m active smart cards

Italian FTA satellite platform Tivùsat is ending 2021 with 4.4 million active smart cards. More than 10 per cent of Italian households now receive satellite TV through Tivùsat, for an estimated audience of six million viewers. The offer consists of 180 channels (TV and radio), of which 60 are in HD. All channels of public […]

December 3, 2021From Branislav Pekic in Rome

EBU adds Davie, Marchand, Soldi to exec board

Tim Davie (BBC), Gilles Marchand (SRG SSR) and Marinella Soldi (Rai) have been elected to the EBU Executive Board. The new board members were elected by the Directors General of fellow broadcasters at the EBU’s 87th General Assembly in Geneva. The Board is responsible for ensuring the implementation of the EBU’s strategy and policies. Davie […]

December 3, 2021