For the second year running, Lawo and daughter company Audio Broadcast Services (ABS) have combined to help enable audio coverage of the Allianz SE shareholder’s meeting.
Audio Broadcast Services supplied the consoles, fibre optic cabling, engineering, setup, commissioning, and on-site support for the event, held at the Olympiahalle in Munich. The full service provider for event engineering, Gahrens und Battermann, contracted ABS for the second consecutive time. Gahrens and Battermann were given overall responsibility for the entire infrastructure, including logistics, for the third consecutive time.
Three Lawo mc²56 consoles were used. While one was allocated to the video control room, two consoles were installed as redundant FOH consoles. All feeds were required for the video stream (i.e. the large monitors set up in the Olympiahalle) and the Internet stream, as investors were also able to follow the entire meeting live via the Internet.
The systems were designed with full redundancy – including the router card, the DALLIS-I/O systems, the fibre optic cables, and microphone inputs for the speakers, as well as those set up for questions from participants. The former were split in the analogue domain and connected in parallel to two DALLIS frames. The second DALLIS frame was connected to the second layer of the console, to allow manual switching at the push of a button. The microphone stations were opto-coupler controlled.
The main challenge was the installation of a fully redundant system. This included a redundant power supply, a system for the redundancy of all relevant microphones and sound reinforcement zones, as well as sound reinforcement via DALLIS I/O systems with both digital and analogue connections. Each DALLIS frame was equipped with an uninterruptible power supply to increase operational safety even further. Two days were scheduled to complete the event setup.
For German car manufacturer BMW’s shareholder meeting at the same location, ABS was once again hired to provide the sound, using exactly the same equipment.
“Lawo’s technology offers precisely what we need for this kind of event: fully redundant systems that can be set up and taken down quickly, and offer a logical and simple structure for the user, that is easily monitored,”said Matthias Paha, manager of ABS’s operational activities. “As a FOH engineer, I use Lawo consoles myself for various events. It’s just great that the system provides such a high resolution and reproduces every nuance realistically, all without having to resort to the filters. Even if the internal filters and dynamics are used, it quickly becomes clear that you are dealing with a perfect tool that leaves hardly anything to be desired. It’s just great fun to work with these consoles!”
