The Senedd Cymru (Welsh Parliament) in Cardiff Bay could foresee an increase in their regular committee business following the start of the new 5th Assembly term.  The Senedd Cymru already had a purpose built Siambr (Chamber) and four dedicated committee meeting rooms which were equipped for broadcasting.  Building a fifth dedicated televised committee room would increase capacity for concurrent meetings as well as add resilience to the existing infrastructure.  It was agreed in November 2016 that all the rooms in the corridor that the fourth televised committee room was situated in would be removed and a new layout would be designed and installed which would include two new fully interactive televised committee meeting rooms.  An additional television gallery would be constructed for the fifth meeting room and the original fourth gallery updated to fit with the new fourth committee meeting room.

NEP Bow Tie as the Host Broadcast managed services contractor was asked to design, supply and install broadcasting, audio conferencing, simultaneous translation, video conferencing and display monitoring in these new areas.  A further key point in the brief was to deliver intuitive, user friendly software control of the technology in the rooms.  This needed to comply with the Parliament staff’s ever growing requirements from within their business for accessible user friendly communication technology to enhance meetings within the rooms.

Unobtrusive, adaptable, modern ‘dome’ cameras were recommended and selected for seamless integration into the room without compromising image quality or the clean, uncluttered interior design.

We worked with the Parliament’s project team and stakeholders to specify and provide Audio Visual and Video Conferencing systems for the new rooms. Witness presentations from laptops can be displayed in the room and are available to the Broadcast Director.  In addition contributions from the Polycom Video Conferencing systems we installed allow witnesses across the world to be connected and captured in the meeting coverage.  A central matrix distributes the AV and VC content to the screens and broadcast suites.

Successful, and on schedule delivery of all phases required a high level of flexibility, working with and around the client’s electrical and building contractors.  Daily updates, weekly client meetings, progress reports and use of our expertise and innovation ensured that NEP Bow Tie were able to support the Parliament and guarantee a successful outcome on this exciting project.  From initial conversations to completion, the whole project was conducted on a narrow time frame of under seven months.