The International Broadcasting Center (IBC) is a facility where television, radio, and other forms of broadcast companies come together to provide its services to their flagship stations, connecting the Asian Games to the rest of Asia.
The IBC is located at the Songdo Convensia, a center where companies had held meetings and exhibitions before its conversion into the International Broadcasting Center it is today.
“The IBC contains 20 broadcasting companies and two marketing agencies, Dentsu, and MP & Silva.” explains Kristen Sung-mi Kim, Business Department of IAGOC. “The broadcasting companies relay the feeds that come in to the IBC to their broadcasting channels.”
Of the 20 broadcasting services at the IBC, Chinese Central Television (CCTV) and Japanese Broadcasting Corporation (NHK) have had long-time interest in providing coverage of the Asian Games.
Controller of CCTV Sports, Jiang Heping, shared CCTV always invests interest in the Asian Games.
“We are in Asia. We value the Asian Games as a part of the Asian Family. China is a big country in Asia, we are also obliged to make the Asian Games a success. China sent the most delegates to this year’s Asian Games.”, shared Jiang.
“However, we had more interest in the Doha Games because it was two years leading to the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The Guangzhou Asian Games was two years after the Beijing Olympics, so it received less attention. People’s interest became less and less following Beijing. But, now that it is four years after the Guangzhou games, the Chinese people have gained a lot of interest in the Asian Games. We place importance in the Asian Games. This year we had four big games, Sochi Olympics, Fifa World Cup, Nanjing Youth Olympic Games, and now the Incheon Asian Games. We consider the Incheon Asian Games one of the most important of the year, “ he continued.
With all the positives the Incheon Asian Games has enjoyed, there are inevitable mistakes that come with any major project.
“Some problems we’ve encountered here were air conditioning issues and transportation, but they solved all problems in a very timely manner. It is natural and understandable for a new organizing committee to deal with such a grand operation. They are not the same team that dealt with the Seoul Olympic Games or the Busan Asian Games.”
Jiang revealed that one thing that helped smooth over problems was his good relationship with Deputy Executive Director, Son Cheon-taik.
“I advised Mr. Son to send more shuttle buses for the late-night shifts and he accepted my proposal, and immediately solved the problem. They took the advice and accepted our reasonable proposals."
CCTV and Jiang generally approve of the operations thus far, especially the IBC office space provided. Jiang stated, “The facility is quite good here. It is very tall with a high ceiling, and quite spacious. We simply work here and do not need the MPC facilities.”
CCTV has a 275 member team including reporters, photography, and staff at this year’s Asian Games.
Hironobu Ohno, a technical manager of NHK, shared that NHK has a crew of 100, and of the 100 member staff, 40 are part of the tech team.
“The good thing about working the Asia Games here in Incheon, is that the HD signal is very very good. We haven’t encountered many problems and the workspace here at the IBC has been good,” stated Hironobu.
In regards to the interest of the Asian Games, “There has always been an interest and there always will be an interest in the Asian Games, especially in Incheon. For this year’s games in Incheon, we have a large team, like did for Guangzhou, and Doha before.”
By Alex Isacc (AGNS)
