In Broadcast - July 2016 - 62


62

www.inbroadcast.com | Vol: 6 - Issue 7 | July 2016

InMedia

RTW: 50 Years Of Sound Success
RTW, a leading vendor of visual audio meters and monitoring devices for professional
broadcast, production, post-production, and quality control, is celebrating its 50th year...

F

ounded in 1965 in a storefront in
Cologne, Germany, RTW had a
simple vision - provide first-class repair
services for audio equipment, such as
Revox-brand tape decks and a variety
of consumer radios and TVs. Over time,
RTW grew to focus its efforts on the
Pro Audio industry, developing many
products that have proven vital to the
radio and TV broadcast sectors.
The
company's
continual
technological advancements have
kept it one-step ahead of the steady
progress of the industry. Now, more
than 50 years on, RTW has become a
dedicated audio systems developer
and key vendor of professional
metering equipment, with innovative
instruments and technologies for
visual audio monitoring in broadcast,
production,
post-production
and
quality control.
Early Peaks
The industry's integration of digital
tape recording in the early 1970s
helped launch the RTW brand into
world-wide recognition. In 1971, the
company unveiled its first PeakMeter,
featuring a gas plasma tube, which
is credited for initiating RTW's
overwhelming success in studios
around the world. By 1979, the
company also became the exclusive
distributor in Germany for Telex-brand
products, which included intercom
systems and high-speed tape and
cassette copier systems.
In 1980, the company moved
into a new building in the northern
part of Cologne. It was at this time
that the audio industry began to go
through a digital revolution, with the
development of digital audio tape
(DAT) recorders and software, MIDI
controllers, fibre optic digital audio
transmissions and digital consoles,
among other inventions.
Due to the company's commitment
to providing state-of-the-art, futureoriented solutions, the RTW team
worked hard to create products that
were innovative. In the 1980s, RTW
launched its 1100 Series Peak Level
Meters and Copier Studio M, which
was able to duplicate all tracks of an
original cassette simultaneously, and
incorporated the Sony PCM-F1 Digital
Audio Processor analogue/digital
interface, into its product line.

Timeline...

1978: RTW's Table-top Peakmeter 1206

1993: RTW's MultiMonitor 1066, one of
the first stereo audio monitors

2007: RTW names Andreas Tweitmann
(middle) as CEO

2015: RTW's Continuous Loudness
Control

2016: RTW's newest creation, the APROCLC01 audio processing hardware

Near the end of the 1980's, RTW
acquired
exclusive
distribution
rights of the high-performance audio
analyser and audio test instruments
from Audio Precision, and constructed
its DAT-Control remote control
integration for mixing consoles. In
1990, the company launched its Timer
Series panel-mount stop clock units
with up/down timer modes to capture,
stop, store and sum during production
and post-production.
Reference Monitoring
At around that same time, the
company's engineers began to
recognise a forthcoming need for
audio engineers to independently
produce
loudness
impressions
across a variety of conditions and

styles of audio. This resulted in the
development of reference value
devices with loudness displays that
were incorporated into the company's
PeakMeter (PPM) product. These
measurements were based on data
generated after several empirical
audio tests.
The 1990s saw many important RTW
product developments, such as the
MultiMonitor stereo audio monitor
series, which displays a variety of
instruments
with
comprehensive
adjustable parameters on LC colour
displays, and the PortaMonitor
Series, which are multi-channel signal
displays. In 1997, RTW developed
the DistriCon Series of A/D and D/A
converters to alleviate problems
that were growing as a result of the
increasingly popular digital/analogue
audio interfacing. While many people
were busy worrying about Y2K, RTW
engineers were hard at work designing
the SurroundMonitor 10800, which
allows for multi-channel levelling and
monitoring for Surround Sound audio
systems. The accompanying Surround
Sound Analyzer, which calculates
the dynamic relationships between
the parameters of all channels, was
incorporated into the product the
following year.
Digital Workflows
The increasing digitalisation of audio
products also led to a change in audio
production workflows, providing a new
level of difficulty for even the best
educated engineers. This led to RTW's
creation in 2002 of the universal,
compact and easy-to-read 1204A
(analogue) and 1205D (digital) tabletop peak program meters as reference
instruments for precise, standard
level control and mono compatibility
monitoring.
Not long after, RTW developed its
SurroundControl 30900 Series, which
combines all elements of metering and
monitoring into one unit. It features
an integrated monitoring controller,
3G-SDI de-embedder and a Dolby
decoder for seamless integration into
the production workflows of modern
broadcasting and TV studios. In the 12
years since it first entered the market,
the RTW SurroundControl Series has
received several extensions to enable
loudness metering (prior to the release

of actual loudness standards) and
enhancements of the hardware and
audio inputs.
Quality Commitment
In 2007, after 42 years of successful
business activity, the founders of the
company handed RTW over to the
capable hands of Andreas Tweitmann,
who today serves as CEO of the
company. Not long after, RTW received
ISO 9001:2008 quality-management
standard certification from TÜV
Rheinland Cert GmbH, a further
demonstration of the company's
commitment to quality processes
and procedures that ensure ongoing
improvements in the development,
manufacture and support of its
products.
Under Tweitmann's guidance the
company has undergone a significant
revolution in an effort to position RTW
as a highly experienced vendor that
meets customers' requirements with
innovative made-to-measure solutions
and state-of-the-art systems and
technology. RTW was one of the first in
the industry to provide a touch screen
option with its TouchMonitor Series
(TM9, TM7 and TM3) of professional
audio meters, and its subsequent
upgrades. The company also moved
from offering solely hardwarebased solutions to software with its
MasterClass PlugIns: LoudnessTools
and MasteringTools, as well as its CLCContinuous Loudness Control, RTW's
first-ever audio processing tool.
RTW has also made significant
contributions to the introduction of
mandatory standards for loudness
metering and control, including the
company's involvement in EBU's PLoud
group, which has developed binding
loudness-management standards. In
2012, the company moved into their
new headquarters in the western
part of Cologne, where RTW currently
resides.

"...I am extremely proud

of the success we have
seen as a company
in the first
50 years"

Andreas Tweitmann
CEO, RTW
http://www.inbroadcast.com https://www.youtube.com/user/RTWKoeln https://www.youtube.com/user/RTWKoeln
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