Harris Broadcast Split Into Two Companies

Harris Broadcast, part of the Gores Group, has been split into two companies that have been named Imagine Communications and GatesAir. The announcement was made at an inaugural MediaDay held at Madison Square Garden in New York City.

Imagine Communications will be headquartered in Dallas with offices in Denver, Toronto, Los Angeles, Tel Aviv and Beijing. According to the company, The company's five decades of media software and networking innovation has secured more than 3,000 customers spanning 185 countries, with more than 3 million products deployed that support more than half the world's video channels, along with a rich portfolio of patents.

GatesAir will be headquartered in Cincinnati with its state-of-art manufacturing, supply chain and fulfillment center in Quincy, IL. The roots of GatesAir go back to pioneering over-the-air TV and radio transmission innovation for nearly 100 years.

A new media platform is being introduced. Imagine Communications MediaCentral is an integrated, end-to-end ad sales, traffic, scheduling, automation and playout platform that places key capabilities in the cloud, which were previously provided only in distinct, separate, and often premises-based platforms. Steve Reynolds, chief technology officer of Imagine Communications says, "It creates an underlying architecture of modular, IP-based services that can fully support the integration of media and playout functions, such as live log integration, simplifying operations and providing advanced service velocity for operators."

Imagine Communications is also introducing Software Defined Workflows (SDW), a capability enabled by the company's MultiService SDN architecture. Media companies currently operate in a hybrid environment of both baseband and IP workflows. SDW manages video through a broadcast facility by allowing the entire workflow to be software defined, bringing all media into the IP layer and separating the media content components from control.

"We are thrilled to bring back the positive market heritage associated with the name Gates," said Rich Redmond, chief product officer, GatesAir. "We gain the best of both worlds by empowering our expert teams, technology and customer base, while also gaining exclusive focus and entrepreneurial autonomy to best serve the over-the-air radio and TV market."

Imagine Communications and GatesAir will release details on numerous initiatives in the coming weeks leading up to and at the 2014 NAB Show.