In Broadcast - October 2013 - 26

I N T E R N A T I O N A L

WWW.INBROADCAST.COM | ISSUE 24 - OCTOBER 2013

N E W S

InREPLY

Norwia Highlights Key Technologies
Norwia’s Chief Sales and Marketing Officer, Tracey J W Ford,
answers our questions on the company’s products...

26

InB: How is your company
adapting to meet customer
demands?
Tracey JW Ford: It’s always the
case in difﬁcult ﬁnancial times that
industries have to change because
of customers needing to change.
Norwia was founded during these
difﬁcult times with knowledge of
customers’ difficulties. Norwia
from this day had a mandate to
design a newer optical distribution
concept that would give beneﬁts in
all domains. It’s not only a product
concept but also how the company
operates and a new set of business
principles that were needed
to meet our customer’s needs.
The thought of changing so much
is an almost impossible task for a
well-established company but by
no means an easy task for a new
company. Norwia also had to bring
these new ideas and concepts to the
market and change the way people
think about optical distribution.
Not an easy task, because
people’s operational behaviour
has not changed in 15 years.
Norwia has designed some key
technologies, such as AutoSFP. This
type of technology is not about the
SFP, this is not breaking ground.
AutoSFP is about a combination of
hardware and software smarts. This
type of technology gives so many
beneﬁts compared to ﬁrst generation
optical equipment that is currently
available.

The next generation miniHUB optical distribution platform

InB: What criteria are broadcasters
using to select products?
TJWF: Broadcasters want all criteria
but usually they have a main selection
criteria. This could be quality,
reliability, density, extreme operating
temperature environments, easy use,
re-usability, serviceability and price.
In designing the next generation
miniHUB optical distribution platform
we have actually taken all of these key
points. This means that the customer
for the ﬁrst time can have everything!
Today we need to show ﬂexibility
with product design because people
want more value for money and want
to have a simple and easy to use
product. This is exactly what the
miniHUB brings to the table and this
is why we are having great success.
A lot of customers are very
interested in providing quality
optics and broadcasters are starting
to see this. They have had their
disappointments and have chosen
some alternative components for
their optical projects because of the
easy availability. They have learnt
that there is a difference between
optics and customers are looking
for a system like the miniHUB
that can provide quality at a
lower price than many.
InB: Which territories
are
showing
particular activity?
TJWF: Today
the miniHUB
has been on
the market and
established itself
well. We have seen
strong penetration
i n o u r t a rg e t
markets. Even in the
European market we
AutoSFP is about a
combination of hardware
and software smarts

have had great success in a tough
economy. The Americas have
also been very good to us with
some very high end installation
with high profile customers. We
have strategically moved into
the Asia Pacific market as well.
All territories or continents
you might say have a different
approach to sales and marketing
and this is chosen to give us
maximum beneﬁts in each region.
The popularity of the miniHUB and
response from customers has been
immense. Once customers discover
our AutoSFP technology it changes
people’s perception and introduces
a new way of working with optics.
They discover the easy route for
optical ﬁbre distribution.
InB: Any product innovations
ahead that you can discuss?
TJWF: Well, the product innovation
is here now! And we are the only
innovators with this. Going forward
the whole concept will evolve as we
have engineered the miniHUB from
day one to be a platform that we can
easily build on. Existing customers
will have access to any innovation
that we introduce. This makes the
customers ROI extremely pleasing.
We know it’s very important that
the product should be engineered
for the long-term. This only comes
from having optical knowledge that
dates back to the early 90s and our
involvement in the ﬁrst generation
optical products that are still
available to date.
InB: Can you describe some of
your recent deployments?
TJWF: The miniHUB is so versatile,
many deployments for different
solutions all with the same hardware!
We have had CWDM deployments
for SHED, Stadium point-to-point
optical solutions, CWDM long
distance with multi-drop ﬁbre points,

extreme temperature solution for
ﬁbre and outdoor conditions, remote
productions over CWDM, VIP/
Government optical links, Gigabit
Ethernet/Video/Tally and 422 Stage
systems and Multimode CWDM
with Video and Gigabit Ethernet
systems. The list goes on and on...
The customer base is expanding
as well from state broadcasters,
regional stations, stadiums, event
locations, OB projects, government,
justice system and major
telecommunication companies.
If the user is looking for redundancy
and east/west scenarios with auto
switch over, the miniHUB can even
supply this high level of system
design with the same base product.
In one particular deployment we
had a customer using a CWDM
system. They were distributing
video from one site to the next over
a single ﬁbre. The next week the
same customer wanted to solve
an issue of Gigabit Ethernet over
ﬁbre. The customer then reused
the video channel and changed
the SFP’s needed to Ethernet
without going into the GUI for setup
changes at all. This was all taken
care of automatically by AutoSFP
and they were up and running
within no time. This customer
realised the key values behind the
miniHUB system and the extreme
ﬂexibility the system gives its users.
Just imagine owning one product
that can adjust easily between all
these deployments and signal types
with the same card throughout the
entire system. Spares are reduced
and the changes you make are all
automatically taken care of. No
complex GUI’s are required for set
up. This is a strong concept and it’s
why Norwia AutoSFP technology
shines through.
InB: Thank you for taking time to
answer our questions.
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