The Broadcasting Center Europe (BCE) based in Luxembourg is a leader in media services, system integration and software development for television, radio, production, postproduction, telecommunication and IT. Needing an efficient, reliable and secure audio network for a wide range of productions, the BCE turned to Dante. 

BCE serves upwards of 400 clients in various sectors, and operates one of the largest telecom networks for the media market in Europe. Having been one of the first broadcast centres in Europe to fully migrate to Dante in 2017, the build out of a new WAN audio distribution infrastructure required network management that would provide ease of use, expandability and security.

‘We have been using Dante in the centre since 2017 and it is rock solid,’ says BCE Technician, Pierre Fuchs. ‘Now, we have to renew the audio feeds going from our HQ in Luxembourg to different transmission sites and implemented Dante Domain Manager to provide security.’

Dante Domain Manager (DDM) is a network management software suite, enabling user authentication, role-based security and audit capabilities for Dante networks. In this application, it secures BCE’s audio networks and allows for future network expansion.

BCE faced several challenges, first and foremost security, as the network security needs to meet the 24/7 on-air requirements. With Dante Domain Manager, all control traffic is encrypted, and devices are bound to a specific instance of the server, which prevents the hijacking or unauthorised use of the system. The primary vector of security is user authentication, which ties all Dante control actions to specific users.

For BCE, it was important to avoid a central point of possible clock failure. To ensure this, Dante uses PTP (Precision Time Protocol, IEEE1588) to provide synchronised clocking throughout the network. Any Dante hardware device can act as a PTP Leader Clock via the high quality VCXO clock built-in to each one, and Dante incorporates an automatic election scheme that ensures stable PTP functionality even if a Leader Clock device fails.

BCE uses Dante Domain Manager as a network management console, securely connecting audio between each radio station. Instead of setting up single-use connections for each location, it now has a solid, efficient infrastructure that is both scalable and flexible enough to support any production. By setting up various Dante Domains, or groups, BCE can independently control each network from one location. Network administrators and A/V managers can view all of the system components and manage the entire AV network from a single dashboard.

Fuchs and his team have confidence in the system through the DDM Audit Log, which allows them to track activity over any period of time and quickly identify improper workflows, malfunctioning devices and unwanted user actions.

‘In 2017, Dante allowed us to create a production network that was very reliable, flexible and easy to use. Now, with Dante Domain Manager, we can manage the system in a way that is secure and reliable,’ Fuchs says. ‘I look forward to seeing how else we will apply Dante in the future.’