ISILON HELPS TRAVEL CHANNEL STREAMLINE PRODUCTION WORKFLOW AND REDUCES PRODUCTION WORKLOAD BY 30%

Published 16th February 2010

ISILON HELPS TRAVEL CHANNEL STREAMLINE PRODUCTION WORKFLOW AND REDUCES PRODUCTION WORKLOAD BY 30%

Boxer delivers successful implementation of Isilon Scale-out NAS bringing 30,000 tapes into file based content workflow to reduce wasted workflow tasks by 30% at the worlds largest broadcaster of travel themed editorial.

UK — February 16th, 2010 — Isilon® Systems (Nasdaq: ISLN) today announced that Travel Channel, the leading international travel broadcaster, transmitting 24 hours a day in 18 languages to 134 regions, has successfully implemented an Isilon IQ solution as the foundation of a new file based production, scheduling and distribution strategy. The new solution has helped the firm substantially improve productivity while meeting the exacting needs of higher definition content and video on demand.

Working closely with Boxer Systems, an Isilon partner, Travel Channel has built a file-based production, management and distribution system, which includes Apple’s Final Cut Pro 7 editing tools, Phoenix 7’s Zeus media management platform and transcoding and ingest technology from Telestream. The new holistic environment uses Isilon scale-out NAS to serve multiple edit suites and viewing stations at the firm’s HQ in London.

“The complexity and scope of our channel meant that we were wasting a lot of time with physical tapes and the move to a file based environment provided us with a huge set of financial and creative advantages,” explains Matt Westrup, Head of Operations for Travel Channel, “Boxer provided us with help every step of the way and built a system that delivered us the technology we needed but they also helped us to analyse and adapt our processes to take advantage of the new file based environment.”

A crucial element was the selection of the storage infrastructure underpinning the new production environment. The primary goal was to create a central repository with the flexibility to handle many different tasks and innate ability to scale both performance and capacity without requiring additional headcount for Channel’s extremely lean operations department.

“The Isilon solution was selected over a SAN as it provided us with several clear advantages in terms of compatibility, performance and reliability, “explains Westrup, “However, the minimal management requirements have also been a significant benefit and we have had 100% availability since it went live last year.”

The 60Tb Isilon scale-out NAS solution uses Gigabit Ethernet to serve content across every part of the Travel Channel content workflow. “As we increase our High Definition content, we will evaluate adding an Isilon 10GB node, but at the moment, the Isilon storage is handling all we throw it effortlessly.”

Westrup estimates that the centralisation of its 30,000 media tape library onto the Isilon cluster has reduced workflow tasks performed for content production staff by around 30% as the locating, duplication and ingesting of media from its tape library is now a thing of the past. “It has also helped with the creative process as our huge library is now available on tap,” explains Westrup.

“The project has been an unequivocal success,” Westrup adds, “We have a few items to bed down but the new production environment is helping us to expand our operation into new areas such as video on demand and internet TV which would have been extremely costly under our old workflow.”

About Travel Channel International Ltd.
Travel Channel is the leading international travel broadcaster, transmitting 24 hours a day in 18 languages across Europe, the Middle East, Africa and the Asia Pacific region. It is operated by Travel Channel International Limited (TCI) - an independent company headquartered in London, UK.

Launched in 1994, TCI uses 20 satellite feeds to reach over 700 cable, satellite and IPTV Affiliates. The company produces and commissions original programming across the world.

About Isilon Systems
Isilon Systems (Nasdaq: ISLN) is the proven leader in scale-out NAS. Isilon’s clustered storage and data management solutions drive unique business value for customers by maximizing the performance of their mission-critical applications, workflows, and processes. Isilon enables enterprises and research organizations worldwide to manage large and rapidly growing amounts of file-based data in a highly scalable, easy-to-manage, and cost-effective way. Information about Isilon can be found at http://www.isilon.com.

About Boxer Systems
Boxer Systems have been working for almost 20 years in the Broadcast and Post-Production arenas supplying equipment and integrated systems to a range of industry leading clients based in the UK.

Boxer specialises in file-based work-flow solutions enabling customers to improve their performance and save money by implementing innovative and flexible end to end solutions.
Further information can be found at www.boxer.co.uk

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The names of companies mentioned herein are the trademarks of their respective owners.

For More Information, Press Only:

Lucas Welch, Isilon Systems, +1-206-315-7621, lucas.welch@isilon.com

Anne Harding, The Message Machine, PR for Isilon in the UK, +44 (0) 1895 631448, anne@themessagemachine.com