MUMBAI: Red Bee Media has been contracted to playout the BBC’s High Definition (HD) technical trial that will run from mid-2006. The trial will be transmitted from the Broadcast Centre in West London, where Red Bee Media has installed a dedicated HD playout system, as part of its commitment to providing broadcasters globally with the most advanced services and technology,

The BBC's trial HD service will be broadcast for nine to 12 months from mid 2006 on digital satellite and cable. It will also be tested on digital terrestrial on a technical trial from a London transmitter. Trial content on all plaftorms will consist of simulcasts of major events and some repeats of landmark productions, states an official release.

Red Bee Media CTO Chris Howe said: "Red Bee Media has been testing HD technologies for the past year and a half. Where we could, we future-proofed our Broadcast Centre when it was built two and a half years ago to accommodate HD services. Red Bee Media offers an end to end HD service and is excited to be playing out BBC’s HD trial".

Red Bee Media’s new HD playout solution has been integrated by Television Systems Ltd and includes:

· Omneon HD servers
· Colledia and Omnibus software
· Probel HD mixers
· Axon Dolby E audio processing
· Pixel Power character generation
· Screen Subtitle encoder
· Miranda branding technology

Red Bee Media transmitted its first HD broadcast from its Broadcast Centre to IBC in Amsterdam in September 2004. It then transmitted a specially crafted HD DVB test channel simultaneously in Mpeg 2 and Mpeg 4 from its Broadcast Centre to Amsterdam throughout IBC2005.