Globecast Westlake Facility Ushers in New Era of Technical, Production Capabilities

Live integration of sports now possible via three production control rooms

Globecast is officially open for business in their new home at the Four Seasons, Westlake Village, California. And while it might have taken a couple of months longer than anticipated, Eddie Ferraro, Globecast Americas Managing Director, says the move was made without impact to their 24/7 broadcast operation while also creating some new business opportunities and making the move to a hybrid ST-IP and HDSDI infrastructure.

Globecast Westlake features revamped technical capabilities including three production control rooms.

“It’s a testament to our team that we’re fully operational out of Westlake Village today,” says Ferraro. “With the additional capabilities we can provide live integration for sports, and this is now at the center of our strategy going forward. The words “Four Seasons” and Globecast may seem like the broadcast equivalent of the Odd Couple, but this Four Seasons is different. When it was first constructed, it included a 21,000 sq. ft. broadcast facility, a small teleport, and a 6,000 sq ft sound stage.

Ferraro says the move adds seven new service expansion spaces, providing approximately 2.5 times more room for innovation, colocation, and operations compared to the original Globecast building in Culver City, which had been in operation since 1984. “We’ve increased our domestic network bandwidth by 10x, to 100Gb and in another sign of the times, we also went from 24 satellite antennas down to two at Westlake Village.

We’re now successfully managing RF remotely via multiple locations to augment our business needs.” Ferraro says the technical operations center and master control rooms have also been expanded and improved technically. “The configuration of the space allows us to expand our MCR to be able to accommodate many more channels and associated support operations including dedicated space for a customer’s OTT platform operations,” says Ferraro. “As everything moves into the cloud and/or through our networks, it’s imperative we have an IP infrastructure at the core that not only supports our customers today; it also supports them tomorrow. This means we are ready for live UHD, HDR, HFR, AR, VR productions, which can include a multitude of simultaneous sources from remote locations.

It’s a complete paradigm shift and the combination of moving to this new facility and completing our move to IP means we can best serve the industry’s needs now and in the years to come. There are also three control rooms for live integration and/or remi production and a 6,000 sq. ft. studio space that can be used for localized production. This additional space will prove useful for upcoming major sporting events such as the 2026 World Cup and 2028 L.A. Olympics. Ferraro says another advantage of the new location (along with the additional space and the upgraded infrastructure) is that Globecast is now in a contiguous open space on one floor. “We have a lot more scalable space that our teams in the US and the other Globecast regions can utilize to deliver services to our customers. It’s much more flexible and is capable of even more expansion. An exciting future awaits.”