Joining the team at the Dubai Media City office, Mr Charles' task is to continue SGI's success in Europe within the three principal broadcasting markets in the Middle East: digital video workflow from ingest to broadcast; graphics and broadband, including Video-On-Demand (VOD).
"Eric comes to us with vast experience in the broadcast field gained both in Europe and the UAE. We welcome him to the team and look forward to a prosperous working relationship," said Gilbert Soufan, territory manager, Middle East and Africa. "Eric will be offering our cutting edge technology to broadcasters in the Middle East, including scalable media serving solutions, which enable the user to manage and distribute digital media. SGI has been a part of this industry for the last 20 years and this has enabled us to design non-proprietary computers and servers with no storage limitations - a huge advantage - that meet the industry's needs; yet remain fully compatible in different environments."
"I'm very excited to be working with SGI, especially in this segment of our industry," added Mr Charles. "Multiple European public and commercial broadcast television network stations use SGI broadcast system solutions, including France Television, TF1, Danish Broadcasting, BR, SWR, Swedish Television and Czech TV. Middle East broadcasters are using our solutions too and that's why I'm here, to continue the tide of adoption in the Middle East."
SGI has a number of Middle East broadcasters using its solutions, including MBC. "MBC has been using SGI products in its post-production work stations for the last eight months: both the Silicon Graphics 02 and Silicon Graphics Octane 2s for news applications, graphics and promotions, using Smoke and Flame software," said Ihab El Baba, MBC technical director. "We chose SGI because it's really the only high end graphics machine company capable of providing what we need: it lives up to its reputation, it's reliable and the technical support is second to none."
ENDS
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SGI appoints business development manager for Middle East and Africa
- United Arab Emirates: Tuesday, March 18 - 2003 at 09:37
- PRESS RELEASE
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Silicon Graphics (SGI) has announced the appointment of Eric Charles as its new business development manager for the Middle East and Africa region.
Eric Charles, SGI's new broadcast business development manager for the Middle East and Africa region.
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Posted by Anne-Birte Stensgaard, News EditorTuesday, March 18 - 2003 at 09:37 UAE local time (GMT+4)
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This article was updated on Sun Sep 14 2003.
Notes and Media Contacts »
For further information, please contact:
Deirdre McKeever
SGI MEA
Dubai Media City
United Arab Emirates
Tel: 00 9714 3902233
Fax: 00 9714 3908088
About SGI
Celebrating its 20th year, SGI, also known as Silicon Graphics, Inc., is the world's leading provider of high-performance computing, visualization products and the management of complex data, services and solutions that enable its technical and creative customers to gain strategic and competitive advantages in their core businesses. Whether being used to design and build safer cars and airplanes, discover new medications and oil reserves, predict the weather, entertain us with thrilling movie special effects or provide mission-critical support for government and defense, SGI systems and expertise are empowering a world of innovation and discovery. The company, located on the Web at www.sgi.com, is headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., and is represented in the Middle East by SGI MEA, based at Dubai Media City, United Arab Emirates. Tel: 00 9714 3902233, Fax: 00 9714 3908088
Broadcast market
SGI's Broadcast System, or digital video workflow from ingest to broadcast solution is for use in public and commercial broadcast television network stations and provides IT infrastructure (servers, storage, networking) for broadcast production and operational workflow.
Its broadcast facility-wide infrastructure intelligently integrates IT advancements into the video domain. It includes servers, storage and networking with ingest, edit, automation and archival applications found in broadcasting today.
This solution simplifies workflow and reduces dependence on black-box legacy gear to provide increased efficiencies and enable the long-term transition to an IT-enhanced data-centric workflow (dataflow). Interface to best-of-breed editing and automation systems allows tighter integration across entire facility versus digital islands. Shared SAN architectures integrated with facility-wide data network provide increased access to video content and lower cost; and strong networking and storage architectures increase production efficiency and easy re-use of assets.
Graphics market
These solutions are optimized for broadcasters, cable companies, telcos and digital media production studios; and are a combination of SGI servers and digital video options; and SGI and third party software applications.
Media production facilities are creating and/or converting more of their content into digital formats. More digital processes are being introduced into filmmaking (eg digital intermediates) and more versions of media assets are being produced: film, DVD, VHS, D-cinema, PPV, broadcast, Video-On-Demand (VOD) and Internet.
As large media facilities transition to a data-centric model and the tools migrate from purpose-built, specific resolution black boxes to high-performance general-purpose computers, the digital infrastructure becomes more and more important.
SGI provides the ultimate infrastructure solutions by combining industry-leading shared-filesystem technology (CXFSTM), unrivaled bandwidth, scalability, high-availability tools, hierarchical storage management, Data Migration Facility (DMF), and reliable backup capabilities. This drives efficient workflow to allow profitable production processes, solves facility-scheduling issues by allowing easy reallocation of production resources and allows facilities to combine production tools of their choice without being locked into a particular operating system.
Current implementations in the field include Warner Brothers, eFilm, and Laboratoire Eclair.
Broadband - Video-On-Demand (VOD)
Telcos have spent billions deploying fiber for long-haul and middle-mile networks and in some cases xDSL access networks into the home. They now need to generate additional revenue with these access networks beyond the traditional voice and high-speed Internet access services currently deployed. Video-on-demand represents a killer application for both increased revenue and reduced customer churn.
The SGI VOD solution combines reliable, cost-effective, high-throughput SGI servers and storage subsystems with the industry's acknowledged leaders in open video server software.
A large ecosystem of VOD application vendors, network equipment providers, IP television head-end equipment manufacturers, and set-top box suppliers round out the overall solution. SGI's deep expertise and local presence in VOD allows SGI to play a professional services role in implementing and deploying large-scale residential IP television services.
SGI VOD solutions are in a dozen telco lab trials worldwide. They are also deployed in Europe, Japan, and China, including the largest recent telco deployments in both Japan (Softbank/Yahoo Japan) and Asia (Chunghwa Telecom Taiwan). The SGI VOD solution is currently being optimized for cable operators with expected first betas in Q2 CY 2003.
Further information is available at www.sgi.com
Deirdre McKeever
SGI MEA
Dubai Media City
United Arab Emirates
Tel: 00 9714 3902233
Fax: 00 9714 3908088
About SGI
Celebrating its 20th year, SGI, also known as Silicon Graphics, Inc., is the world's leading provider of high-performance computing, visualization products and the management of complex data, services and solutions that enable its technical and creative customers to gain strategic and competitive advantages in their core businesses. Whether being used to design and build safer cars and airplanes, discover new medications and oil reserves, predict the weather, entertain us with thrilling movie special effects or provide mission-critical support for government and defense, SGI systems and expertise are empowering a world of innovation and discovery. The company, located on the Web at www.sgi.com, is headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., and is represented in the Middle East by SGI MEA, based at Dubai Media City, United Arab Emirates. Tel: 00 9714 3902233, Fax: 00 9714 3908088
Broadcast market
SGI's Broadcast System, or digital video workflow from ingest to broadcast solution is for use in public and commercial broadcast television network stations and provides IT infrastructure (servers, storage, networking) for broadcast production and operational workflow.
Its broadcast facility-wide infrastructure intelligently integrates IT advancements into the video domain. It includes servers, storage and networking with ingest, edit, automation and archival applications found in broadcasting today.
This solution simplifies workflow and reduces dependence on black-box legacy gear to provide increased efficiencies and enable the long-term transition to an IT-enhanced data-centric workflow (dataflow). Interface to best-of-breed editing and automation systems allows tighter integration across entire facility versus digital islands. Shared SAN architectures integrated with facility-wide data network provide increased access to video content and lower cost; and strong networking and storage architectures increase production efficiency and easy re-use of assets.
Graphics market
These solutions are optimized for broadcasters, cable companies, telcos and digital media production studios; and are a combination of SGI servers and digital video options; and SGI and third party software applications.
Media production facilities are creating and/or converting more of their content into digital formats. More digital processes are being introduced into filmmaking (eg digital intermediates) and more versions of media assets are being produced: film, DVD, VHS, D-cinema, PPV, broadcast, Video-On-Demand (VOD) and Internet.
As large media facilities transition to a data-centric model and the tools migrate from purpose-built, specific resolution black boxes to high-performance general-purpose computers, the digital infrastructure becomes more and more important.
SGI provides the ultimate infrastructure solutions by combining industry-leading shared-filesystem technology (CXFSTM), unrivaled bandwidth, scalability, high-availability tools, hierarchical storage management, Data Migration Facility (DMF), and reliable backup capabilities. This drives efficient workflow to allow profitable production processes, solves facility-scheduling issues by allowing easy reallocation of production resources and allows facilities to combine production tools of their choice without being locked into a particular operating system.
Current implementations in the field include Warner Brothers, eFilm, and Laboratoire Eclair.
Broadband - Video-On-Demand (VOD)
Telcos have spent billions deploying fiber for long-haul and middle-mile networks and in some cases xDSL access networks into the home. They now need to generate additional revenue with these access networks beyond the traditional voice and high-speed Internet access services currently deployed. Video-on-demand represents a killer application for both increased revenue and reduced customer churn.
The SGI VOD solution combines reliable, cost-effective, high-throughput SGI servers and storage subsystems with the industry's acknowledged leaders in open video server software.
A large ecosystem of VOD application vendors, network equipment providers, IP television head-end equipment manufacturers, and set-top box suppliers round out the overall solution. SGI's deep expertise and local presence in VOD allows SGI to play a professional services role in implementing and deploying large-scale residential IP television services.
SGI VOD solutions are in a dozen telco lab trials worldwide. They are also deployed in Europe, Japan, and China, including the largest recent telco deployments in both Japan (Softbank/Yahoo Japan) and Asia (Chunghwa Telecom Taiwan). The SGI VOD solution is currently being optimized for cable operators with expected first betas in Q2 CY 2003.
Further information is available at www.sgi.com
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