Most of the IBC Exhibition is given over to the latest products and services, with the vendors urging visitors to consider them right away. But what comes beyond this year’s new star products?
Working with the Conference Technical Papers team, IBC has always had a showcase of cutting edge projects and prototypes. This is the place to spot the headline makers in future years.
The IBC Future Zone can be found in the Park Foyer, outside Hall 8. By invitation, some of the leading research labs and academic bodies are invited to showcase their prototypes, and discuss their thinking.
This is a really interactive area. The people manning the stands and running the demonstrations are the scientists and engineers who are working on the projects. They welcome your feedback and thoughts – it could be the insight that takes the work in a new and more exciting direction.
To emphasise the interactivity, this is also where the posters from the Technical Conference can be found. If the peer review committee sees a paper covering valuable and interesting work which is not yet ready to present in the conference, it will invite the authors to present it as a poster. The authors are regularly found alongside their posters, happy to discuss the detail of the work.
This year, the organisations chosen to participate in the IBC Future Zone span the whole spectrum, from new names to some of the most famous in the business. There are broadcasters, academic institutions and start-up businesses; companies big and small.
Japanese broadcaster NHK and BBC from the UK are both regular IBC Future Zone participants, thanks to their long history of industry-leading R&D. This year they are joined by the Swiss labs of The Walt Disney Company.
Major companies represented include NTT Network Innovation Labs and Thomson Video Networks. Specialist research bodies include the Academy of Broadcasting Science of SARFT and ICoSOLE from Austria.
Also showing their cutting edge ideas are 3Flex and AutoPost Projects; Jaunt VR; LiveLike; Swissaudec; Two Big Ears and Vision III Imaging.
All the exhibitors in the IBC Future Zone have important things to say about the future direction of the technology in our industry. Make sure you get involved in the debate.
You can find these future-looking companies in the Park Foyer, near Hall 8, and the IBC Future Zone is open throughout the exhibition hours and is free to all visitors.
Visit www.ibc.org/futurezone to find out more information.
