Bitcentral, an Irvine, Calif.-based developer of broadcast automation and archiving technology, recently conducted three installations of its Precis digital news production system all on the same day.

The stations—KSEE, an NBC affiliate in Fresno, Calif., KMTV, a CBS affiliate in Omaha, Neb., and KTVM, an NBC affiliate in Bozeman, Mont.—scheduled the installations on the same day, (Dec. 14), to take advantage of a small window of opportunity between November ratings and the end of the year holiday periods. To accommodate all three stations, Bitcentral compressed its training period, which usually spans six to eight weeks, down to three weeks.

“The massive installation was Y2K-like,” said Dave Bukowski, senior broadcast engineer at KSEE, which now fully deploys Precis. “We were scrambling to get everything prepared and ready for our station’s launch on Precis. The moment came, and everything went so smooth; we didn’t need dub reels and everything just went very well from beginning to end. The operation was virtually flawless and within budget, not to mention within such a short period of time.”