Amsterdam, 11 September 2015 – France Télévisions, the French public broadcaster, has chosen Sony as the official supplier of its news cameras. This follows a public tender launched in 2014, as part of a project to standardise and upgrade its technology. The objective was to find the optimal way to renew and standardise the range of news and documentary cameras – composed of old Sony camcorders and other standard camcorders – for all of the newsrooms for the premier French public service broadcasting company.

Over a period of four years, the company plans to progressively deploy more than 500 Sony news cameras. The models used are camcorders from the latest generation Sony Professional XDCAM line-up, produced in Europe at Sony's Pencoed factory in the United Kingdom:

• The PXW-X200 handheld camcorder, the PMW-300K1 semi-shoulder mount camcorder, the PMW-400 shoulder-mount model, as well as the PMW-RX50 field recorder/player and the SBAC-US30 drive for ultra-fast ingest

• The recording media chosen is the Sony SxS card, a robust and professional media that has been proven in field operation

• France Télévisions has decided to transition to HD via the Sony XAVC-25 Mbps codec, which will offer an image flow equivalent to the current DV25 for a vastly superior image quality (1920x1080 422 10 bit Long GOP)

Sony's bid was able to meet France Télévisions' expectations for various criteria: fluidity of the SD to HD migration process, equipment ergonomics, very high image quality and the support of the teams during deployment of the new solution.

Fabien Pisano, Sales Manager for France and southern Europe at Sony Professional, said: "Investment in these new tools for journalism and in the associated workflows will strongly contribute to maintaining and developing France Télévisions' leadership in the field of news, while continuing to offer the highest quality images in its transition to HD. With the digital revolution, information is everywhere all the time: being the first to produce the key image, or the right image, is a real challenge for news services. It requires demanding editorial work as well as proven and robust professional equipment with a high reputation in the field, such as the equipment in the XDCAM line-up".
​Sony, a leader in the field of news production and broadcasting

Sony XDCAM solutions are still must-have items in Europe and around the world. Launched in 2003, the XDCAM family has become a standard among the many broadcasters looking for fast and reliable tools and workflow for news production and reporting. Sony's expertise and constant attention to the needs of the market have also recently won over major players, such as the NRK in Norway, TVE in Spain, Polsat in Poland, ITV in the UK and Al-Jazeera.