Discover Digital, EFX launch digital conference solution

Next generation conferencing solution from filming to monetisation and content distribution

Broadcast production specialists, EFX Productions, and parent company Discover Digital, have launched a full-service solution to take major events and conferences online.

The new conference broadcast service will allow organisers of major events to seamlessly move their conferences online to Discover Digital’s dedicated online conferencing television service, where event organisers can brand, monetise and gather data on their events.

Stephen Watson, MD of Discover Digital and director of EFX Productions, says the new instance of the Digital Conferencing platform has been created to enable the creative, exhibition, conferencing and events industries to continue staging their events despite the constraints caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown.

“We now offer a full suite of production services and a fully enabled platform to allow conferences to move seamlessly to the digital space.” says Watson. “The DD-EFX conference offering is customisable and can include filming and production, editing and packaging of third-party content, digital ticket sales with multiple payment options, content distribution and tracking of views. For sensitive data such as internal communications, we can also operate extremely closed user groups.”

Because the service is hosted on Discover Digital’s advanced VOD and Live TV digital platform, it offers a range of features not available on most video-conferencing and streaming platforms.

EFX Productions, experts in the production of TV broadcast content, will film and edit content to ensure the event is elevated by professional quality footage. Brendan Marsay, Executive Head of technology and director of EFX Productions, notes that the company has been entrusted with key projects such as the Kyalami 9 Hour broadcast and IP distribution, ESPN Africa/Fox Sports Events broadcast and streaming, the Nelson Mandela Lectures Series featuring Barack Obama and Bill Gates, concerts featuring James Blunt, Drake, Kanye West, Parlotones and Andrea Bocelli, and services for corporate clients such as Sasol, Bidvest and Absa over the past ten years.

Using various payment gateways, events can be monetised through ticket sales online or at selected outlets, with payments via a range of channels. Each event is then hosted on a dedicated page where sponsor branding and additional information can be featured. Furthermore, Discover Digital’s purpose built back-end can track individual viewers, what they watched and for how long, enabling organisers to gauge interest or allocate CPD points if necessary.

“The new DD-EFX conference service has been introduced amid growing demand from events organisers who expect COVID-19 fears and travel limitations to impact their events for some time to come,” says Marsay. “Event organisers need to deliver a far more polished package than a slide presentation in a video call. We can help create something more professional, bespoke and enjoyable to watch,” says Marsay. “The digital conference service, targeted at major events with large audiences, can prove more cost effective than physical events, with broader reach and greater longevity. Our teams can also archive material and make it searchable, and we can re edit content for use as video on demand, corporate or social media content,” says Marsay.

“In addition to our outside broadcast (OB) van or flight kits which we use at client premises or venues, EFX also operates a studio so clients can come to us. The studio is fully kitted with a stage style lighting rig with over 30 moving fixtures, a 3mm LED wall and 5 Broadcast spec cameras to elevate the clients’ production to internal TV standards,” concludes Marsay.