Radio.Cloud is highlighting the adoption of its automation platform by a Texas station.
“Hispanic Broadcasting Inc. KYST(AM) is among the industry’s first broadcasters to fully embrace Radio.Cloud’s new transformative operating model,” the software supplier said in its announcement.
“This enables stations to operate entirely from the transmitter site, integrating all incoming satellite feeds into the cloud workflow. This move is in line with Radio.Cloud’s overall mission of empowering broadcasters through technology to reduce expenses by moving away from legacy systems and hardware.”
The station broadcasts with 5 kW by day; it markets itself to Houston but its towers are in Texas City.
The industry has become accustomed to hearing about more stations operating with streamlined air chains. The description of this application seems to take it even further:
“KYST’s adoption of the new operating model heavily reduces their hardware footprint,” Radio.Cloud wrote in the announcement.
“All equipment required to run the station — including satellite dishes, uplink and receivers — can now reside in a very small area at the transmitter site. The ability to process and control cues from satellite receivers in the cloud can save the broadcaster tremendous hardware expense. The setup is even simpler for music and non-satellite stations. It’s also easy to broadcast live completely from a web browser with just a microphone and internet connection.”
Does the station still have a studio? It does, used for a live morning show each weekday. “They are running this through Radio.Cloud’s browser-based Live Studio, however, so they don’t actually need the studio,” a Radio.Cloud representative told RW. “All of the important infrastructure is out at the transmitter site.”
The announcement was made by Radio.Cloud CEO and founder Christian Brenner and Hispanic Broadcasting President/Owner Matthew C. Velasquez.
The company quoted Velasquez saying, “Radio and the technology behind it were starting to feel archaic. … Our biggest technical issues stemming from our automation were always hardware-related more than software-related. The idea of having a cloud-native automation system versus a local server gave me peace of mind that we would not have any major technical issues going forward.”
Radio.Cloud said its cloud-native operating model is customizable depending on a broadcaster’s needs and suitable for syndicators or groups looking to distribute content across multiple markets.
