Strong Demand for Avid Software-Defined Storage PlatformNexis

Avid Technology, Inc. announced significant global adoption of Avid NEXIS, a software-defined storage platform designed for storing and managing media.

Since its introduction at NAB 2016, substantial numbers of production and post-production facilities have implemented NEXIS. Powered by the MediaCentral Platform, it delivers dynamic virtualization and media-savvy collaboration, enabling customers to accelerate production and increase efficiency.

Stop-motion animation studio Laika, LLC has invested in NEXIS | E4 for its current and future animated feature films.

“At Laika, we have an uptime environment-meaning we cannot have downtime-with editorial at the heart of production and multiple projects running at the same time,” said Trevor Cable, lead media engineer and editorial manager, Laika. “Avid NEXIS provides us with great media management, unrivaled reliability, and high bandwidth at a competitive price. It was very easy to deploy and it’s simple to create users, groups and workspaces. I have complete confidence in Avid NEXIS | E4 and plan on purchasing another for failover redundancy.“

Creative post-production house Gorilla Post uses Avid workflows to accelerate production and enhance collaboration at every step of the creative process – from ingest and editing, to sound design and mixing, to color correction and finishing. The Dublin-based facility expanded its workflow to include NEXIS | E2.

“With all of our Avid-centric workflows at Gorilla, Avid NEXIS was an easy choice,” said Barry Reid, MD and owner, Gorilla Post. “Our decision was based on the continued reliability we’ve always experienced with Avid products. The bandwidth is so fast that any edit suite in the facility-be it offline, grade, mix or finishing suite-can access the large dailies/transcodes from our ingest station with minimal downtime. It’s hugely beneficial.“

Using NEXIS in a provided-facilities environment for an outside broadcast production, Video Europe deployed NEXIS | E4 at UK music festival, Latitude.

“We required a reliable shared storage environment to handle the demands of a fast-turnaround, multi-camera live production,” said Ollie Stratton, engineer at Video Europe Ltd. “Working with mixed formats meant the workflow needed to be resilient to handle whatever was thrown at it. The combination of Media Composer and the Avid NEXIS storage environment was a perfect match for this on-site deployment.“

Other companies that have invested in Avid NEXIS include major US television broadcast networks; US Basketball team The Miami Heat; Canadian broadcaster CBC; The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; UK independent TV production company Spun Gold; UK full-service post-production house The Edit; Belfast-based production company Paper Owl Films; French television network La Chaine Parlementaire; French sports news channel Infosport+; German broadcaster CBC; Germany’s Federal Ministry of Defense; Italian digital satellite television platform Sky Italia; Arabian television channel Discovery Networks MENA; and Doha-based state-funded broadcaster Al Jazeera.

“Avid NEXIS addresses the unprecedented explosion of content and the need for more robust storage infrastructure, reliability and collaboration,” said Jeff Rosica, senior VP and chief sales and marketing officer, Avid. “With strong adoption across the globe, post-production organizations and broadcasters are reaping the benefits of the industry’s first and only software-defined storage platform by accelerating production and increasing efficiency.“

NEXIS enables virtualized storage so organizations can adjust storage capacity mid-project, without disrupting workflows. Customers can select components that meet their needs, and grow as their needs change. NEXIS is a scale-out storage solution that enables customers to tune the system to ensure that high-priority workflows always have the capacity, performance and data protection levels they require. Customers can give critical projects performance, while throttling back on less critical workflows. This ability lets teams react to changes, adjusting performance and protection levels to match the needs of a project at any stage in the workflow.