The Grass Valley cameras will be used in HBO’s digital production studios in New York City, and the servers and routers will be installed in HBO’s main playout facility.

HBO senior VP, broadcast operations and engineering Charles Cataldo says, “For HBO, moving to the automated K2-based distribution systems from Thomson has resulted in the development of an electronic workflow that has increased efficiencies and allowed us to put safeguards in place to ensure the reliable distribution or our programs.

“We wouldn’t trust our playout operations to anything but Grass Valley server technology because we’ve grown comfortable with the mission-critical 24/7 performance they provide. Moving to the new K2 server systems is the next logical step in our evolution to high definition.”

Thomson’s Broadcast and Professional Solutions business unit senior VP Jeff Rosica says, “Thomson has a long-standing relationship with HBO that has been very fruitful for both companies. HBO has been instrumental in the continuing development of Grass Valley K2 server system from Thomson and we’re pleased to continue to support HBO and help it achieve its goals as it moves aggressively into the distribution of HD programming to meet new consumer demand.”