Case Study: TV Tokyo achieves a digital-ready, mission-critical commercial broadcasting system with LANSA

Tv Tokyo Builds Commercial Broadcasting System With Lansa and Java

TV Tokyo, through its IT arm TV Tokyo Systems, rebuilt a 20-year-old System i commercial broadcasting platform to meet the demands of Japan’s move to digital TV and new digital-era functions (datacasting, EPGs) while still supporting analog during the transition. The project faced a tight schedule, over 4,600 programs to develop, frequently changing and hard-to-define requirements, parallel development for TV Osaka, and coordination problems across a rapidly expanded team.

To meet the challenge they chose LANSA for its iSeries compatibility and productivity, used Java for the rich client queue-sheet UI and CL/RPG for batch processing, and centralized decision-making by stationing operational leaders on-site. The system went live in March 2004 (three months behind plan) and was refined over six months, successfully supporting analog and digital broadcasts, enabling program and ad transmission, and achieving substantial productivity gains (man-hours reported at less than half compared with RPG); lessons learned included earlier on-site requirement decisions and more LANSA training.

TV Tokyo

Kazuyuki Nakama

Deputy Manager, Operations Department