IP Performance Celebrates ELBA's 20th Anniversary in Style at Sugar Quay
IP Performance were honoured and proud to be asked to exhibit at "East Side Story", the 20th anniversary celebrations of ELBA, the East London Business Alliance, which were held on Tuesday 30th June at the Man Group jetty on Sugar Quay, behind the Man Group and Tate & Lyle buildings in Lower Thames Street, London. Opposite the HMS Belfast and a stones' throw from Tower Hill and Tower Bridge, the venue provided stunning backdrops for the evening of activities and entertainment, celebrating the the 20 years of community involvment in, and commitment to, East London by the ELBA member companies.
ELBA was created to establish possibilities to bring about positive change in East London by channeling the wide-reaching resources and influence of the private sector to address key areas of need. It counts over 100 East London-based companies as its members, including Aon, Accenture, Aviva, Barclays, BP, BT, Canary Wharf Group, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, EDF, FSA, FTSE, HSBC, Lloyds, Man Group, Morgan Stanley, the Met Police, London City Airport, ITV, MAN Group, News International, Nomura, Qualcomm, Reuters, Rothschild, Skanska, Tate & Lyle, Thames Water, The National Theatre, and Trinity Mirror.
The event was opened by a keynote presentation from Richard Reed of KPMG, the new Chair of ELBA, and followed by an inspirational speech by Joshua Adejokun, the newly-elected Young Mayor of Newham.
In keeping with the theme of the event, guests were entertained throughout by cheerleaders and gymnasts from the local community, dressed as Olympic athletes, running, leaping and performing acrobatic feats.
The theme was, of course, the upcoming 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, and to promote this the London Legacy 2020 committee set up a "Legacy Zone" in the main marquee. "The 2012 Games will highlight the UK at the cutting edge of new digital technology, and our ambition is for the Olympic Broadcast Centre to become a major new hub for the UK's broadcast, creative and digital new media, " commented Peter Welton, Executive Director and Chair of the London Legacy 2020 committee. "It is imperative that we secure the support of private enterprise, and engage and maintain the interest of local government and communities in the emerging digital technologies that will facilitate a successful Olympic delivery, and secure a lasting legacy for the local communities, post-Games."
IP Performance demonstrated multiple simultaneous streaming video applications on a widescreen LCD TV, delivered over the Avocent HMX Desktop-over-IP switchable KVM extender system.
Close by, Roland Brown and Steve Owen of Quantel had a 3DTV simulation running, using polarisation filters and polarised glasses (as opposed to red/cyan anaglyph filters). Sky has announced 3D content for the 2012 Games, and Alcatel-Lucent's Metro Ethernet fibre-based access solutions and highly scalable IP/VPLS/MPLS aggregation and core networks are designed with the high bandwidth and low latencies required to support these multilayer, multistreaming technologies.
Elswhere in the Zone, a keynote presentation of a fly-through of the Olympic Park and some images of the broadcast Centre were projected onto the wall, while Roll7, a charity that works with young people developing computer games demonstrated MindGames, an interactive PC game controlled by electrical signals from the brain.
"Amadin Ryan of AMO Media introduced us to ELBA after our recent HMX product demonstrations at the De Lane Lea studios in Soho," said Pierre Ketteridge of IP Performance. "We are hoping to consult with and advise ELBA and the LL2020 committee on the communications infrastructure required to underpin the build out of the International Broadcast Centre, Media Press Centre and associated facilities, and are highlighting the benefits of a high-speed fibre infrastructure, such as that provided by the Alcatel-Lucent Metro Ethernet solutions. We are also mindful of the transformation project, post-Games, when whatever infrastructure has been provided must transition seamlessly to support new tenants, applications and business models."
"We are grateful to ELBA for giving us this opportunity to showcase our products and services to such an influential audience." said Matt Dadd, Account Manager at IP Performance. "We wish ELBA and the London Legacy 2020 committee every success as they concentrate their efforts and focus on delivering a truly world class Olympic and Paralympic Games, and hope that we can assist in transforming the resulting infrastructure into a sustainable and lasting legacy for the people and communities of East London, moving forward."
