Ross Video opens new Asia headquarters in Singapore
Published: ASIA
SINGAPORE: On 23 November, 2016, Ross Video celebrated the grand opening of its new headquarters for Asia in Singapore. The new facilities are spread over four floors and serve as the operating base for the near ten-person strong sales and support team around APAC director of sales Andrew Tan. Equally important, the headquarters provide ample space for customers to try and experience the wide range of the Ross’ video production equipment and technologies in a real-world setup. ‘This is not only a place for “us here,” but also a place for our business partners in the region and colleagues in the field to bring their customers as well,’ explained Mr Tan.
CEO David Ross travelled from Ross Video’s global headquarters in Ottawa, Canada, to deliver the opening speech to around 80 A/V professionals, broadcasters and trade partners gathered from the entire APAC region in between Australia and Bangladesh. 'We have not had a down year in 25 years. Even through the recession, even through currency changes, we’ve grown on average 17 per cent per year for 25 straight years,' Mr Ross was happy to report. ‘We’re getting bigger,’ he elaborated, ‘but we’re not slowing down. The reality is we’re speeding up and we’re going faster.’
‘It’s all about passion,’ said David Dowling, Ross Video’s VP of sales for EMEA, APAC and Oceania. ‘We love the industry; we love and believe in what we’re doing. It’s very much about developing new products, to move forward, to move the whole industry forward.
‘We are expecting significantly more business in Asia in the years to come,’ Mr Dowling added, ‘and Singapore is an ideal hub for us for a number of reasons, but mainly because we have great staff here.’
The story of Ross Video is one of outstanding success. Now in its 43rd year and about 640 employees strong, it has offices in several locations on the American continent as well as in Europe and Asia including China and soon to be followed by Sydney, Australia. With its products found in over 100 countries, Ross Video is a major player, noted Mr Ross. ‘Among the hundreds if not thousands of companies in our industry, including big consumer brand names like Apple, last year we’ve been already ranking 25th. This year, in only one year, we jumped seven spots to 18th. I think that’s unprecedented, and shows that the Ross brand is going up like a rocket.’
Mr Ross was recently named ‘Ottawa’s CEO of the Year’ for his achievements, including the impressive long-term expansion of the company. That growth is credited in part to Ross Video putting customer satisfaction and support first, as spelled out in the company’s widely publicised ‘Code of Ethics’, including infamous lines such as ‘We will not ship crap’. Driven to set trends, rather than follow, Ross has developed or acquired market leading technologies (no less than 12 companies have been acquired by Ross Video during the past seven years – reportedly all internally financed). Having recognised the importance of IP media solutions, Ross Video recently joined AIMS.
Ross Video’s commitment to innovation shows in its product range, from its traditional focus, video production switchers, through most everything needed in live video production environments. The full product line includes solutions for processing, routing, asset management and both conventional and robotic cameras.
'Live productions have always been Ross Video’s focus.' noted Mr Dowling. 'We have introduced new technologies helping users to work smarter, do things easier.’ Ross has leveraged its video switcher prowess into packages suited for smaller venues or smaller budgets (ie the Carbonite Black or Carbonite Black Solo). ‘For facilities with larger budgets who want to do more complex and higher quality productions,’ Mr Dowling added, ‘we have our flagship Acuity switchers, our robotics systems, and they might even want to add in some augmented reality to enhance their production.’
As Mr Tan elaborated, 'Scalability is key. For example, Dashboard [system control software] allows venues and HOWs to create their own smart and efficient user interface, customised for them, even by themselves, to churn out high quality video without complicated operations.’ Mr Tan noted. Built in capabilities like assignable mix effects, he offers as an example, bring flexible and sophisticated production power to even Ross’ most cost effective Carbonite Black switchers, paired with easy operation.
Ross’ PivotCam, a PTZ camera introduced at IBC 2016, was ‘designed with typical HOW venue sizes in mind,’ added Mr Ross. ‘A small footprint, 20x optical zoom, high sensitivity and excellent image quality fits HOWs [and similarly sized venues] perfectly. Dashboard control makes it part of our ecosystem, and its very attractive price allows the addition of more PivotCams for better coverage.’