At this year's NAB Show, Sony fired a shot across the bow of Thomson Grass Valley and Ross Video when it said it was adding optional automation capabilities to its MVS series production switchers.

The software overlay will give the Sony switchers the brain power they need for news production automation, a growing sector now dominated by Thomson Grass Valley’s Ignite system and Ross Video’s OverDrive.

But rather than just catching up with the others, Sony says it intends to leapfrog them by introducing more advanced automation technology.

“Our product will be an order of magnitude better than the others,” says Rob Willox, director of marketing for Sony Electronics' Content Creation Group.

“Our goal is to be more intuitive, do more, be less restrictive and more open to the people using it. And the reliability factor will be better.”

Willox says that Sony expects to show the new product at NAB 2009—“At least, that's the goal.”

“We've been working on an automation solution for the past few years," he continues, "trying to get everything ironed out before we go to market. That's why we're a little—I don't know if you want to say behind—but we'd like this product to mature in the lab rather than in the field.”

Sony spokesman Tom DiNome adds that the new software is being examined by several broadcasters and beta trials will be set up “in the near future.”

Sony faces a daunting task because the installed base of its competitors' products is more than 200 and growing.

Stations are embracing news automation systems from Grass Valley and Ross Video to cut costs overall or to re-allocate resources from news production to new money pits like local HD news, digital transmitters, subchannels and Web sites. In general, the systems use software to manage the production of live newscasts, controlling everything from cameras to graphics to audio.

“Between our first-generation and our second-generation product lines, we have a total of 140 installations out there,” says Grass Valley’s Alex Holtz. “There are now 82 second-generation Ignites at stations in 60 markets.”

Major Ignite users include KABC Los Angeles, KTVU and KGO in San Francisco, WPVI Philadelphia, WSB Atlanta, WPXI Pittsburgh and KIRO Seattle.

Ross Video's OverDrive is also making headway.

“We've launched systems in nine of the top 10 markets in North America,” says Ross Video’s Brad Rochon. “We have around 75 systems on air right now, including WMAQ in Chicago, KXAS in Dallas, KDTV and KRON in San Francisco, KNTV in San Jose, and we're launching at KNBC in Los Angeles in a few weeks.”

But comparing Ignite and OverDrive is somewhat an of apples-oranges proposition.

While Ignite is tailored primarily for news, Overdrive is also used for network operations and sports production. Its customers include Major League Baseball and Harpo Studios.

“Their goal is the same, but they're two different technologies,” Rochon says. “They have different feature sets and different philosophies on production workflow.”

Joe Snelson, VP, director of engineering, Meredith Broadcasting Group, which has purchased both systems, agrees.

“Their philosophies and workflows are different,” he says. “With Ross, the switcher is more the focal point than with Ignite. But the end result is virtually the same, which is efficiency, and being able to utilize fewer people to get something done.”

Another difference: At NAB 2008, Grass Valley introduced MediaFuse, an add-on to Ignite designed to let broadcasters seamlessly extend their content to new media like online and mobile.

“We now have a strategy for them to compete not just over the air but against Internet video from newspapers, radio, Google and Yahoo with a single workflow multidistribution method,” Holtz says. “The control room can now be leveraged to generate new revenue.”

With OverDrive, Rochon says, “you can start anywhere from $50,000 and go up to $150,000, depending on redundancy options, training and other factors.”

Ignite prices range from about $100,000 for the smallest system and rise to as much as $1.6 million at the upper end, according to Holtz.

ABC's O&O's are leaning toward Ignite.

“We have three stations with Ignite systems on the air, and three more stations in very early stages of installation or planning for installation,” says Dave Converse, VP-director of engineering at ABC Owned Television Stations.

Converse says that the arguments for implementing news automation systems are compelling; they include greater efficiency, lower costs, fewer errors and better quality.

He plans to introduce news automation to the rest of ABC's stations “over the next few years,” adding that he will probably stick with Ignite “because we've invested a lot of time and effort in making the product work.”

The network wing of ABC, however, has opted for a Ross OverDrive system, Converse says. It has been installed at ABC's Washington bureau.

Like the ABC group, Meredith has purchased mostly Ignite systems, but has also selected OverDrive for certain applications.

“We have five Ignite systems,” Snelson says. “Two are in Hartford, one in Nashville, one in Greenville, S.C., and one in Saginaw, Mich.

However, at WGCL in Atlanta, Meredith installed a Ross OverDrive system because “they have a certain workflow pattern where they need to manually control the switcher, and for that they needed OverDrive's bigger switcher panel,” Snelson says.

All in all, Meredith says it's satisfied with the way news automation has progressed, despite the bugs.

“When you first put automation systems in, you've got interfacing issues between the hardware and third-party vendors,” Snelson says. “Plus, there's always a little twist that's different from one installation to another. So you have to get over those hurdles, and everyone has to get trained. That's the pain you go through, but generally once you get past that, things level out and go forward.”

Many broadcasters, however, are taking a wait-and-see position when it comes to news automation.

“I'm not sure that systems are yet where people want them to be,” says Dave Muscari, VP, program development, at WFAA, Belo's ABC affiliate in Dallas. Muscari helped push the station to broadcast the first HD newscasts in the Dallas-Ft. Worth market.

Although WFAA has long had a reputation as a technical pioneer among local broadcasters, the station is still a holdout when it comes to news automation.

“The technology is unproven at this point,” Muscari says. “There are still a lot of bugs. We've watched others' experiences. It has been interesting and we haven't made any decisions. We're evaluating it as it comes down the line.”

Although 200 stations have already bought into either Ignite or OverDrive, hundreds of other stations remain potential customers.

Rochon believes news production automation makes sense for any station in the top 150 markets. “After that, it's diminishing returns, because the smaller markets don't have the budgets to buy not just the systems but the related technology, which includes robotic cameras, servers, and so on.”

All of which points suggests that there may be room for Sony, or any other manufacturer, to come in with a more capable and reliable product.