Institute for Broadcasting Technology
| Institute for Broadcast Technology GmbH - IRT - |
|
|---|---|
 logo |
|
| Carrier: | German public broadcasters , ORF and the Swiss broadcaster SRG SSR |
| Legal form of the carrier: | GmbH |
| Seat of the wearer: | Munich |
| Facility location: |
Munich , Germany
|
| Branch office: | - |
| Type of research: | Broadcasting and media technology |
| Areas of expertise: | TV , sound , online, program distribution |
| Management: | Michael Hagemeyer |
| Employee: | about 140 |
| Homepage: | www.irt.de |
The Institut für Rundfunktechnik GmbH (IRT) is the research institute for all public broadcasters in Germany ( ARD / ZDF / DRadio ), Austria ( ORF ) and Switzerland ( SRG SSR ), based on the BR television site in Munich - Freimann . The IRT pursues charitable purposes and serves to promote European broadcasting and European broadcasting technology.
All shareholders declared in 2020 that they wanted to terminate their partnership agreement with the IRT as of December 31, 2020. This closes the IRT.
activities
The institute conducts research in the field of radio , television and internet technology . It improved existing system solutions for the production and distribution of broadcasting services, developed and assessed new technologies and supported their implementation in practice. The IRT represents the interests of broadcasting through its participation in various international bodies such as B. EBU , ITU , DVB , WorldDAB etc.
A list of the annual research and development activities can be found in the institute's annual reports.
The institute is the publisher of the technical guidelines of the public broadcasters in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
The so-called Wittsmoor list was maintained in the IRT until June 2018 and made available to the public free of charge. In this list, important data of the radio and television stations in operation in the Federal Republic of Germany have been compiled centrally.
As part of its public relations work, the institute regularly provided information in technical and scientific colloquia, which were organized jointly with the Television and Cinema Society and Bavaria Film and which can be accessed as video contributions.
The IRT is currently working on a social plan for the approximately one hundred employees.
Shareholder
- Bavarian radio
- German wave
- Germany radio
- Hessian radio
- Central German radio
- Northern German Radio
- Austrian radio
- Radio Bremen
- Broadcasting Berlin-Brandenburg
- Saarland radio
- SRG SSR
- Südwestrundfunk
- West German Broadcasting Cologne
- ZDF
history
Predecessor organizations include the radio-technical test center of the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft in Berlin (founded in 1928), the research and development center at the SWF in Baden-Baden and the radio technical center in Bad Homburg (founded in 1945).
In 2017 it became known that a lawyer who was supposed to collect patent proceeds on behalf of the IRT allegedly diverted a large part of the license costs of up to 200 million euros to other accounts. The transmitters supporting the institute accused the IRT management of not being sufficiently interested in how the values of their respective patents developed and so the IRT did not notice the loss either. By 2020, the lawyer had initially repaid 60 million euros. The IRT booked this amount as income in its 2018 balance sheet and reported in the annual report on the “financially best year in the history of the IRT”. The institutions involved were also accused of not having adequately dealt with the activities of the IRT.
chronology
- 1956: Foundation of the institute
- 1957: Start of work at the institute
- 1962: EBU Color TV Working Group PAL-SECAM-NTSC is founded under IRT leadership
- 1966: Start of the development of stereo sound on television
- 1967: Start of the PAL color television system at IFA Berlin , electronic slow motion (football ballet)
- 1970: Blue screen process in television production
- 1974: ARI traffic radio system
- 1975: first trial broadcasts for teletext
- 1981: ZDF starts with stereo sound on television at IFA Berlin according to the IRT two-channel sound system , fiber optic transmission at IFA
- 1982: Eduard Rhein Prize for the development of stereo sound in television , digital satellite radio (DSR)
- 1983: first test broadcast of the radio data system (RDS)
- 1984: Dummy head stereophony for radio plays on the radio, demonstration of 3-D television at the IFA
- 1985: Eduard Rhein Prize for Video Program System (VPS) , first demonstration of the MUSICAM audio data reduction process at DAB on the occasion of the World Radiocommunication Conference -ORB in Geneva
- 1987: Start of the development of the D2-MAC and HD-MAC system as a European EU project
- 1988: first DAB broadcast in Germany
- 1992: digital HDTV transmission via satellite, audio data reduction process MUSICAM becomes ISO standard ( ISO MPEG-1 Layer II)
- 1993: First program broadcast in 16: 9 mode with the compatible broadcast standard PALplus - wide-screen signaling
- 1994: Development and definition of the transmission parameters for the terrestrial digital TV system DVB-T
- 1995: Development of a mediabox for receiving digital TV channels via cable as a joint project by ARD / ZDF / IRT, Deutsche Telekom and Premiere .
- 1996: Virtual studio in the IRT
- 1997: first broadcast of DVB for mobile reception, demonstration of the "Bookmark" and EPG (Electronic Program Guide) for DVB
- 1998: first 5.1 multi-channel sound transmission with DVB
- 1999: Microphone type cardioid level microphone newly developed by the IRT is used in the German Bundestag, demonstration of the Multimedia Home Platform MHP ( set-top boxes ) at the international radio exhibition in Berlin IFA
- 2000: Emmy Award for ISO MPEG Layer II, IRT's MHP reference implementation decisively supports the standard for interactive television
- 2003: Utility bills for the introduction of DVB-T , standardization of the MXF production format , IRT's MXF software development environment and MXF test center
- 2004: first uncompressed HDTV recordings in 720 p50
- 2005: first uncompressed HDTV recordings in 1080 p50
- 2006: Regional Radiocommunications Conference RRC 06
- 2009: Initiative for HbbTV , an open technical system to provide value-added and on-demand offers on TV sets for consumers
- 2010: HbbTV becomes ETSI standard
- 2017: Criminal complaint against a patent attorney for suspected fraud
- 2019: The Mannheim District Court rejects the IRT's claim against the Italian rights marketer Sisvel with regard to patent revenue worth more than two hundred million euros.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ www.irt.de The shareholders. Accessed June 11, 2011.
- ↑ www.irt.de Change in the management of the IRT. Accessed January 25, 2018.
- ↑ www.irt.de Mission. Accessed September 29, 2018.
- ↑ a b From after more than 60 years: IRT has to close: shareholders seal the end , dwdl.de from August 1, 2020, accessed August 1, 2020
- ^ Tilman Wittenhorst: No economic perspective: Institute for broadcast technology is closed. In: heise online. August 1, 2020, accessed August 1, 2020 .
- ↑ www.irt.de IRT annual reports. Accessed May 3, 2012.
- ↑ www.irt.de The technical guidelines. Accessed May 3, 2013.
- ↑ www.irt.de Note on Wittsmoor list. Accessed September 29, 2018.
- ↑ www.youtube.com IRT media library. Accessed May 3, 2013.
- ↑ www.irt.de History of the IRT. Accessed June 11, 2011.
- ↑ a b NDR: ARD also terminates the research institute IRT. Accessed January 31, 2020 .
- ↑ On suspicion of breach of trust at the expense of the IRT: BR files criminal complaint against former patent attorney - press release, May 3, 2017
- ↑ Axel Weidemann: IRT in patent litigation: over two hundred million euros are gone. In: www.faz.net. September 25, 2019, accessed September 25, 2019 .