TSL launches low-budget subsidiary as job losses loom

The systems integrator (SI) has worked on some of the UK’s biggest broadcast projects, including upgrading BBC Nations’ playout operations to HD and MediaCityUK’s studio set-up. But managing director David Phillips said its traditional client base was growing increasingly “cautious and risk averse”.

He said: “All SIs and resellers will agree that the sales cycle, from an initial opportunity through to closing a deal, has got longer and longer.”

The subsidiary, StudioExpert, will run in parallel to TSL Systems, with both companies under the umbrella of parent TSL Holding.

TSL Systems is now in consultation with staff and redundancies are likely to follow, while some employees are expected to transfer to StudioExpert. “For the future health of the business, we have to get costs in line with what the market will pay,” Phillips said.

StudioExpert will provide small-scale and non-broadcast studio projects with turnkey SI services, and will target installation projects that do not have the kind of budgets traditionally associated with large broadcast installations, such as universities and corporate clients.

Peter Knowles, who spent 13 years as a BBC sound supervisor TSL Systems: restructure will see creation of subsidiary StudioExpert before starting his own broadcast sales and SI business in 1996, has been recruited from CVP as StudioExpert general manager.

TSL Systems is two thirds of the way through the implementation of a file-based workflow for Singapore national broadcaster MediaCorp and Phillips said he was keen to pursue more opportunities in the region.

“If there is a poorly performing market, it’s logical to divert attention to those that are more attractive.”