TheBBChas signed a £43m outsourcing deal
withSiemensIT Solutions and Services to
aid its digital switchover programme.
Siemens will design, build and operate a new coding and
multiplexing infrastructure, delivering a managed service until
2015.
The project will enable the BBC to accomplish its transition
from analogue to fully digital broadcasting. It is one of the
largest and most complex coding and multiplexing projects
worldwide.
Coding and multiplexing is the complex process of compressing
and processing the various elements making up outgoing television
signals into a form suitable for transmission to digital
terrestrial and digital satellite set-top boxes.
Through the deal, the BBC will replace and consolidate its
coding and multiplexing infrastructure and expand its transmission
capacities at the same time.
The contract with Siemens gives the broadcaster the ability to
deliver high power
digital terrestrial television that by the end of 2012 will
reach 98.5% of the UK population.
Siemens IT Solutions and Services will complete the
implementation of the solution within two years and run it as a
managed service until 2015.
The BBC was recently slammed by the Parliamentary Accounts
Committee for overestimating the savings to be made from a previous
larger IT outsourcing contract.