Clyde Smith, SVP of broadcast technology at Turner Broadcast System, spoke recently during a webinar about the NAB Show. The webinar was hosted by the UK Department for Trade and Investment and aimed at UK exporters.
Smith gave his perspective as a customer for the many vendors planning to attend the show. “First and foremost, [we go to NAB] to learn about advancements in existing technology … We bring all our engineering teams together for a pre-NAB briefing. We look at press releases and announcements about interesting technologies we might want in the future.”
Obviously, this is not a normal NAB, with attendance expected to be down. Some people have even proposed replacing trade shows with virtual meetings. According to Smith, the show is an opportunity for Turner staff to learn about advancements in existing technology, and to explore new developments and breakthroughs. At the show they can also discuss current projects with vendors and talk about future needs. The show is an obvious place to bring multiple vendors together to solve problems with current projects. “You can sit down with the key people and discuss complex issues,” Smith said. MXF was a good example. “Every year at NAB and IBC, we would bring together 12 manufacturers to discuss our MXF developments; we made significant face-to-face progress,” he said. The group had made many calls and webinars, but the face-to-face meetings moved things forward.
“The show also provides education and new ideas for the design engineers who have to build our next state-of-the-art islands of technology,” Smith said. “Turner staff can compare and contrast product features, discover and interact with emerging vendors and with the smaller vendors. It is also an opportunity to meet with international vendors with little or no U.S. representation.”
