Partnership Focus: CUC Solutions

Increased Efficiencies through Integration

Myers, developer of the ProTrack broadcast management system, and CUC Solutions, a data storage technology systems integrator, have partnered at over 35 PBS member stations, providing them with a tightly integrated and affordable Media Asset Management (MAM) solution. By integrating program scheduling and traffic with archive management and playout, media facilities can automate the movement of content and it’s metadata based on actual scheduling requirements and station-defined business rules — resulting in increased productivity and profitability.

As Robert J. Wyatt, Chief Technology Officer, KAKM further reinforced, “We significantly reduced our operating costs by replacing our non-integrated MAM solution with the integrated CUC/Myers solution. Although minor changes to our workflow were required, it was a logical, painless, and seamless transition. It works as advertised and we are saving time and money. As such, we have absolutely no regrets!”

The Myers portion of the solution is responsible for managing broadcast assets throughout their entire lifecycle by serving up media locations to end-users, and automating the movement between playout and storage devices — including purges when required. The CUC portion of the solution provides the automated tiered archive (Blu-ray/LTO) technology and SAN storage necessary to house media content (on-site or in the cloud).

The integration between ProTrack MAM and the CUC Archive leverages the FTP protocol. Using this common and simple interface, ProTrack MAM can retrieve directory listings from the playout servers and nearline storage, and direct file movements between them. It also allows CUC to abstract the complexity of tiered storage in a way that is flexible and transparent to ProTrack.

Managing Content…In Real Time

This integrated approach, developed by CUC and Myers, eliminates numerous upstream and downstream tasks by automating the movement of metadata and its content. The benefits of the solution go far beyond day-to-day operational efficiency. Coupling real-time asset management with predefined business rules dramatically reduces media storage costs.

The CUC/Myers combination is one of the most cost-effective MAM Traffic and Archive solution available on the market today.

Since installation of the CUC/Myers MAM subsystem, we have significantly reduced, if not 99.9% reduced, repetitive media handling, eliminated all paper trails between technicians and Traffic, and have achieved near faultless media tracking and movement between On-Line and CUC Near-Line archive. A scheduled program has never failed to be either retained in the On-Air server or retrieved from archive as scheduled. There also has been no ‘missing tapes’ from the library, which used to occur frequently. The CUC/Myers MAM solution has been absolutely without fault, completely in the background and out of mind.
— Erwin Roman
Engineering Manager
WKNO

“Overall efficiency, quality control, and more cohesive interaction between Traffic and Master Control were vastly improved after installation of the CUC/Myers MAM solution. An added unforeseen benefit was a major reduction in the On-Air storage capacity utilization, going from 95-99% to an average daily 60%. Both companies have exceeded our expectations in regards to technical expertise and responsiveness to issues, both big and small. It just works!”
— David Broeckelmann,
IT Broadcast Services Manager