Egyptian National Radio and Television selects Intercom AEQ for its headquarters in Cairo
Egyptian National Media Authority (ENMA) is the country’s public broadcasting organization, operating under government mandate. Founded in 1945, ENMA has established itself as one of the most important broadcasters in the Middle East and Africa, both for its size and for the quality and volume of its Arabic-language content. It is also a prominent member of leading international organizations such as the EBU and ASBU.
ENMA currently produces and manages 19 independent radio channels, including national, international, regional, and thematic stations, as well as a wide range of television programming consisting of three national channels, one international channel, and six regional channels within Egypt.
ENMA’s headquarters are located in the iconic Maspero building in Cairo, on the banks of the Nile River, a true icon of the city’s skyline, recognizable for its imposing size, height, and characteristic rooftop covered with transmission antennas.
After many years of satisfactory operation with a KROMA Telecom digital intercom system and following a rigorous supplier selection process through international tender, ENMA’s Technical Department has chosen the AEQ CONEXIA intercom system, together with AEQ TP9916 user panels. This is a large-scale intercom installation, in line with the size and operational complexity of ENMA’s headquarters, one of the main broadcasting centers in the region.
AEQ’s intercom technology allows end users to share resources, optimize their workflows, and manage control of their productions on robust and highly reliable systems equipped with redundancy and capable of delivering the highest audio quality and advanced signal processing. This is state-of-the-art technology based on AoIP audio networks and a centralized control model that represents a decisive step towards comprehensive and simplified content management, aimed at ensuring the best end result in complex production environments.
The heart of the CONEXIA intercom system is the AEQ XCORE intercom matrix, with the capacity to interconnect up to 1,000 different devices. The CONEXIA system deployed includes full operational redundancy in this central matrix, with dual power supply, redundant DSP platform in N+1 format, and multiple controllers, thus ensuring high availability, which is essential in a critical system such as intercom. The supply is completed with 128 state-of-the-art AEQ TP9116 intercom panels, equipped with color screens and multiple operating levers, distributed throughout the 25 floors of ENMA’s headquarters.
The AEQ CONEXIA platform is presented as a comprehensive solution capable of managing all communications and audio contributions in an installation. Its structure is based on a broadcast matrix, which allows for the largest number of audio formats currently used on the market to be available in a completely modular way, selecting resources according to the specific needs of each system at any given time. This modularity also allows for total system redundancy, with automatic backup on both the controllers and the audio processing cards and crosspoints, and even on the multichannel or discrete I/O cards themselves. The internal TDM bus scales the matrix up to a size of 1,024 x 1,024 ports.
All this makes AEQ CONEXIA a system with broadcast audio quality, at 48 kHz and 24 bits, providing flexibility and robustness to any audio management and intercom project.
The structure of the AEQ CONEXIA system is based on the XCORE audio matrix, housed in a four-rack-unit chassis divided into three main blocks. The front section contains slots for DSP cards, which are responsible for audio processing and communication crosspoints. This processing is performed dynamically, allowing for back-up cards with automatic function switching. The system has 20 slots for these cards, which are used depending on the size of the system and the installation requirements. At the rear, the system has two types of slots: two for controller cards, with redundancy option, and another 21 dedicated to input and output cards for the different audio formats required in each application, such as SDI, fiber, AoIP, analog or digital audio, among others. Finally, the system incorporates a central back panel that acts as an interconnection point and as a transmission platform for the system’s 1,024-channel TDM bus. The CONEXIA Master provides a higher level of management, allowing control of the entire intercom layer and distributing the crosspoint commands defined in the configuration map created by the user.
On the other hand, the new TP9000 series of user panels has been designed with broadcast quality to ensure compatibility with the digital technology of CONEXIA and CrossNET matrices. Audio is digitized and processed at 24 bits and 48 kHz, with a bandwidth of 20 Hz to 20 kHz and negligible distortion and noise levels. Using the EP9116 expansion panel, it is possible to configure systems with up to 64 physical levers. Ease of installation has also been taken into account, incorporating IP connectivity capable of managing high-quality audio in DANTE format, compatible with the AES67 standard. The panels also feature analog, KROMA digital, and VoIP ports, as well as an internal DSP that enables digital audio processing for acoustic echo cancellation and automatic leveling of voice power, tone, and speech habits for each operator. The acoustics have been carefully studied to achieve maximum intelligibility and natural sound.
The AEQ TP9116 panels offer “Talk” and “Listen” functions, as well as individual volume control for each communication point, using four-way toggle keys, with 16 crossover point keys and four pages, accompanied by four RGB graphic displays. The front panel also includes a gooseneck electret microphone, an internal speaker, and a Mini-XLR connector for headsets. Within the TP9000 panel family, there are two user panel formats and one expansion panel available: rack panel (TP9116), desktop panel (TP9416), and expansion panel (EP9116).
This important project in Egypt has been led entirely by ENMA’s technical engineering, projects, and operations team, together with AEQ’s central services in Madrid and the valuable support of the company’s local partner, WHASH, in the country.
For more information about ENMA, visit https://www.maspero.eg/
For more information about AEQ or the equipment and systems it manufactures and its projects, visit www.aeq.eu, send an email to aeqsales@aeq.es, or call +34 91 686 1300.
