World Wrestling Entertainment Tag Teams With Avid

Avid ^® (Nasdaq: AVID) today announced that the world’s largest professional wrestling company, World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), has invested in a new production workflow powered by the Avid MediaCentral™ Platform. By embracing Avid Everywhere™, the global sports media company can enable its production teams to work more efficiently.  WWE has chosen to protect its investment in the new workflow solution, as well as its media assets by implementing a back-up system so it can continue to produce content in the event of an unexpected disruption.

WWE is a global sports entertainment company headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut. The company is one of the largest producers of original content, which is distributed via broadcast, cable, web, DVD, print, and its own streaming network to 180 countries across the globe. To help manage the huge amount of content it produces—including 40 hours a week in the U.S. alone—WWE needed a scalable, efficient, and integrated workflow to generate and manage content.  The media giant also felt it was of utmost importance to include an integrated backup production system in the solution design to maintain its production workflow.

“We can now edit and distribute all of our content seamlessly within the Avid environment,” said Mike Grossman, senior vice president of Television Operations at WWE. “With a centralized system, we can manage multiple production groups and repurpose content much more easily. Avid’s integration with third-party applications means that the system can grow with us in the future, and the new back-up system mitigates the risk of disasters affecting our production and revenue.”

WWE’s centralized workflow is comprised of solutions from the Avid Media Central Platform, which is made up of products and solutions from the Avid Media Suite, Storage Suite and Artist Suite. Content created in the field is funneled through WWE’s central ingest department, stored on an Avid enterprise storage system, and made instantly available to all 140 Avid Media Composer^® non-linear video editing software seats. With the ability to share files, and work in high or low resolutions, production teams can quickly start and turnaround projects.

The integrated Avid workflow also gives WWE the flexibility to repackage and repurpose content for various products, shows and countries. With | Production^®Avid Interplay, international and domestic teams can work with the same files simultaneously, and enter rich metadata to facilitate subsequent media search and retrieval. The home video department and network originals teams can then easily find and work with the same media—without needing to re-ingest it.

WWE’s new disaster recovery system will duplicate its core Avid storage and Interplay infrastructure in a virtualized environment at a remote location, with synchronization and management tools, including Interplay Virtual Media, Interplay | Transfer and Interplay | Archive. WWE is working with the Avid Professional Services team to design its workflows, commission, integrate and test the new system, and fine-tune it to WWE’s needs, while Avid Worldwide Training is providing customized, on-site training.

“WWE is a shining example of how media organizations can build open, integrated workflows with the MediaCentral Platform to help them quickly and efficiently create, manage and deliver huge volumes of content, and get the maximum value out of their content,” said Jeff Rosica, senior vice president, chief sales & marketing officer, Avid. “And with the disaster recovery system designed by Avid Professional Services, WWE and its investors can be confident that its production and revenues are protected.”