March 31, 2025 • 37 mins
TJC’s live TV shopping network reaches 30+ million homes–and every seamless broadcast depends on rock-solid connectivity. In this episode of Critical Connections, broadcast managers Victoria Roche and Martin Willingham reveal how Dejero technology keeps their live broadcasts running flawlessly–from fast setup to uninterrupted streaming.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
But we knew,
okay, well, if I get a PathWay fromDejero, it'll work because it's Dejero.
It always works.
It always works.
Having that relationship with awith a supplier that goes beyond
just I buy a thing off you,you send it to me.
Done.
I know that if I have a problem,I can call Sukh. And Sukh
is probably gonna find some wayto help me out.
And as a result of that,we've bought a lot of stuff.
(00:26):
Not because we just like big fans of Sukh,although we are obviously,
and not just because we're big fans.Because we know what's going to happen.
We know it's going to work. I'mgoing to plug it in.
I'm going to stick a Cat 5 in the backand you know, it's going to work.
I don't even have to worry about it.
It's a stress gone.
It's time saved.
It's money saved really.
(00:57):
Welcome to
Critical Connections,
a podcast that featuresthe stories of the people and companies
helping to make our communitiesconnected, informed and stylish!
From sparkling beginnings to radiantfutures, the journey of the British Home
Shopping Network includesTJC and Ideal World. Since then, it's become
a giant in the UK's onlineretail landscape.
(01:20):
In addition to its website, TJC featuresan engaging live TV shopping network
reaching more than 30 million homesin the UK and the Republic of Ireland.
Joining me now
from the UK are Broadcast ManagersMartin Willingham and Victoria Roche.
He's been with the company for nine years,
so he lives and breathes video productionand live broadcast.
(01:41):
Welcome, Martin and Victoria. Hello. Hi.
Thank you. Thank you for having us.
Also joining us is Sukh Grewal,a Sales Account Manager with Dejero.
Sukh is a solutions troubleshooterand a deeply passionate
professional solvingconnectivity problems.
Happy to have you with us for this one.
(02:02):
Happy to be here. Thanks for having me.
Okay, let's jump right in.
For those who are not familiar with TJC,
tell us about the organizationand what has made it so successful.
So TJC has been around
in the UK now since 2006.
It's part of the bigger VGL group.
(02:22):
So VGL started by supplying– so many ofthe high street or like shopping mall
retailers likely carrysomething from the VGL Group,
and it was decided in about 2005, 2006
that we were going to skipall that and sell direct to our customers.
And the way the Chairman thought was goingto work out was by shopping television.
(02:44):
TJC was started in the UK.
We've got our colleagues atShop LC in America and our
newest, the baby of the bunch,which is Shop LC in Germany.
So there was a TJC in Germany.
Obviously, the financial recession hitthat went away because it,
you know, it needed some changes.
And now we reentered the German marketand we're doing quite well there.
So we're quite happy.
(03:05):
So yeah.And that Ideal World was an acquisition.
Ideal World is a 24 year plus old brandthat's been going in the UK.
You know,
You know, one of the leadersin the shopping television world here
and they had some trouble a few years
back, you know, various ownersand stuff like that.
So we were very pleasedwhen the opportunity
(03:27):
came to us to rescue that brand,bring it back,
make it in our image,make it in our style.
And we're very pleasedwith the two offerings
we have in the UK, Shop LCin the US and Shop LC in Germany as well.
So the group's getting quite big,we're getting quite ambitious,
but it's really exciting toto have been a part of it at least,
you know, for the last nine years.To see all the changes over the years,
(03:48):
I mean, let's start with you first,Victoria, tell us a little bit about what
it used to be, even just a few years ago,and sort of where we are today.
Yeah
so I joined TJC four years agoand it was in the peak of Covid.
So TJC was very different then.We had a lot of buyers, suppliers,
a lot of expert gueststhat would always come into the studio,
(04:09):
and during Covid that wasn't allowed.
So we changed thethe way we completely operate doing that.
So obviouslyusing yourselves with Dejero,
we got a lot of remote guests inthrough the app.
And then we expandedand now we travel all around the world.
We've done OBs in Bangkok, India,
Tucson, Verona, all over the world.
(04:31):
And that was just not somethingthat was on the cards four years ago.
And obviouslyacquiring Ideal World as well.
That was a completely different landscapeto how it was four years ago as well.
So, I mean, me and Martin, and we've we'vedecommissioned three studios, we've built
two brand new ones, and we're lookingto move facilities again soon.
So it is an ever changing landscape.
(04:52):
It's wild to me that so much can happenin one year, never mind five years.
And of course, Martin, you've beenwith the organization since 2015,
so even more changes for you.
Yeah, it's the amount of changesthat we've had.
When I first started, it was a little bit,you know, kind of wild there.
You know, it was we had a lot of fun.
(05:15):
But if you were making, you know, 4
or 5000 pounds an hour,you were high fiving, you know,
we we've had this big change in a marketthat people perceived as getting smaller.
We've only grown.
And obviously Covid did changekind of everything for us, really.
But before that as well,the sort of the growth
(05:37):
that we've managed to sustain,has been quite impressive really.
And I think it's because,you know, our operation is cost effective.
We're very sensible with thewith the with the money.
And also we are giving our customersthe sort of products they need.
And also, you know,we're here to talk with you guys.
So going all around the worldand showing our customers,
(05:59):
hey, you know, wewe talk about this Vicenza Gem Fair.
Well here we are.
We talk about Tucson Gem Fair.
Here we are, you know.
Oh what's that?You're buying a patch of spa products.
Well, here we are in a spa. Right.
So all of these things,
I've shown our customer for.
I remember the first onewe did in Tucson,
and people were askingif it was green screen.
(06:20):
We had to get Chris up thereto walk through cactus to prove that
no, we are actually here.
Did he stung by any of that cactus?
Unfortunately he didn't.
I love that. Because that would have madea great story.
Good for him.
But I love Chris.
I like winding him up.
It's like my favorite,my favorite game is just to, like,
(06:44):
you know, play play on hima little bit, so he, yeah,
but we had to we had to get him to do itbecause they just didn't believe
that we actually went there.
Because shopping networks don't do this,right?
Shopping networks don't do it because,
you know, traditionally, if you have,you'd have to have massive budgets.
A truck, a SAT link,
you know, in the UK, a line to tower,which we have for other reasons.
(07:05):
But like all of that,all those bookings, doing
all that stuff,it gets super cost prohibitive.
Whereas Dejerohas allowed us to actually go
to these places and do it,you know, without spending a ton of money,
but still providing quality outputthat looks good as well
because it makes, you know, even if,you know, we do a show and the sales
(07:26):
are ho hum.
Optically, it's fantastic to sayto the customers, hey, we're here,
you know. Well, let me pick up on thatbecause the evolution of TJ includes
Dejero and the storyis actually really interesting.
TJC wanted to take its live auction styleprograming outside of the studio.
You mentioned that, to locationsaround the world, ushering in really a new
(07:47):
era for the production and broadcastingof tele shopping shows. So
talk to us about the idea and
then Dejero, whatit was able to helping you to achieve,
through this new way of doing television,if you will.
Yeah. So,
it was weird because the US had alreadystarted using Dejero.
(08:10):
They had already acquireda couple of EnGos, which are a little bit
long in the tooth now,but they're still going.
And we said, okay,now we want to get in on this. Now,
we did trial a thing a few years before
where we did it in like a really,
kind of budget way.
They tried to doing it over like,you know, VoIP
(08:32):
type servicesto try and do it in a cost effective way.
But of course, that that's not resilient.
And it wasn't very great quality.
And, you know, so we said, hey,we want to do it.
And my colleague in the States, Joe, said,hey, get this.
So we got it with, you know,honestly pretty little expectations.
It was okay,well we'll see how this thing goes.
(08:53):
And then Sukh actually came inand, trained all of us,
and he just had, you know,I think 6 or 7 people just staring at him
like... trying to understand.
I still remember that day.
Yeah. Yeah,I'm sure all of trying to be like What,
So what's this thing do? What's this or?
How's this going to help ourtele shopping? You know,
and then we suddenly figured it out when,Rich and I,
(09:17):
Rich is one of the engineers,
we got thrown on a plane.And it was, right,
you're going to Tucson, and you're going today.
And we were like, oh, I better get my case
then. And
poor old Rich as well,
terrified of flying.
So turbulence happened.
He grips the seatand doesn't talk for an hour.
(09:39):
He's pauses his movie, and he's like...
Oh. So, yeah, we gotwe got taken off to Tucson,
and from there it was, okay,we can do this.
We can do it anywhere.
And suddenly we're going,well, where's the next one going to be?
And then we started doing Italy.
We've done a ton in Italy.
Italian designers, Italian jewelryand so a ton of stuff there.
(10:02):
So the, the growthof the amount of products we have from you
guys has changed because we've gone, oh,we can have this.
Oh, wouldn't it be niceif we had this, you know,
and it started with like, you know, we,
we had a WayPoint and a couple of EnGosand it was well, return
video would be good on these things.
The YouTube feed's like 30s delayed.
(10:23):
Oh, oh funny, youguys offer this thing called CuePoint. Ah!
So every time we run into a problem,there's been a solution.
And a solution that's,you know, suited our budget quite nicely.
So would you say, Victoria, that, sortof the connectivity solutions have made
something that would have been impossiblebefore for TJC a real possibility?
(10:46):
Absolutely.
I think if we don't just
talk about the OB there, if we talk aboutjust our day to day operations,
Dejero actually provides,since we acquired Ideal World,
it's in a different site.
So all of our transmissioncomes from the TJC studios.
But the Ideal World
studios are across the roadand Dejero offers our B leg there.
So if anything goes downwith our main encoders,
(11:06):
which unfortunately has happeneda few times,
Dejero is there,the connectivity is reliable
and we just knowthat we can always trust it.
And I think that it's just opened upso many possibilities, not just traveling,
but just having that security on siteto always provide– We're shopping
tele at the end of the day. If we're not onair, we're not making money.
(11:26):
And it's so important for usto be able to be on air all the time.
And having that connectivityand knowing that it's safe and reliable
just opens upso many more possibilities for us.
Yeah,
you know, and it's interesting
because I think a lot of organizations,including yours, has,
you know, not just your broadcastfacilities, fiber networks,
you know, just a network in generalto be able to support your different,
(11:49):
you know, activities.
But sometimes the inevitable happens.
And for you at TJC in 2023,
for a period of days,these fixed lines were compromised.
So tell us how you used then, Dero,to help facilitate
what I can only imaginewas a nightmare of days.
(12:11):
Yeah.
Actually, I got corrected on itthe other day.
Just so you know, it was 2022because I thought it was a year prior.
I've,
because I've aged. That's what happened.
I aged.
There's some gray in the beard.I've trimmed the beard.
Because again, when you see the,
the salt and pepper going on herebecause– Hahaha try to block it out, block it out.
Right, I mean, you saw me on Friday,
(12:34):
and that is a manwho has been stressed.
So yeah, we actually lost,
a lot of connectivity into the building
and there was a bit of panic from ITwho started pulling Cat 5s
out of patch panels and stuff,and I'm like, please don't touch anything.
But they were pulling stuff out.
So we had one of our linesinto the building
(12:56):
just go.
And to this day
we've never figured outwhat actually really happened there.
But it kind of, it really made a mess.
A lot of static IPs were lost and stuff,stuff sort of stopped working.
So my first moment there,my first priority was,
oh, goodness.
(13:16):
How do I get all this stuff back on air?
So the first thing that got affectedand the first way that Dejero helped us out,
this is this is even beforeI picked up the phone to Sukh because,
you know, that happened as well.
So the first thing we did was,okay, there's a
there's a saying in tele shopping,which is no L,
(13:37):
no sell. Right?
If you don't have that graphic bar,you know, on the left,
you're not selling anything. So obviously,
we actually– The whole
back end was, was sort of offline, right?
But the whole back end was gone.
So we were actually manuallytaking orders by hand
(13:59):
and catching up, which we did do,and we didn't miss any
and we got some happy customers.
But we briefly used
a Microsoft PowerPointto generate our graphics, which yeah,
you know, it functioned.Wow, that's incredible!
So, yeah.
and that was quite funny.
The producer's going,okay, are you keyed off yet?
We'll exit the slideshow, change the title.
(14:21):
So what had happenedwas we had these Aston machines,
so we use Aston graphicsto generate that that L.
It's massively like overkill for itbecause they do like A/R studios.
What are we doing?We just put that little L on.
But they're very good for the job.
And we've got a guy called Michaelwho is just amazing with them.
I wentright, I know where I've got connectivity.
(14:42):
I've got connectivity at home.
So luckily, I'm very lucky to livein an area that's got amazing fiber.
So I've got really good speed.
Even if I didn't though,
you know, I would've probably still been okay.
So I kidnapped an Aston machineand I kidnapped an EnGo.
And I was sat there and I was thinking,oh.
(15:05):
And with the MD at the time,a guy called Srikant, he's going,
oh I could take this machine homeand get the graphics running from there.
And he goes,why are you still sat here? Move.
Move, like go.
So then I loaded all this stuffinto my old car, which is great. You know,
you know, it's great
when you've got more value of equipmentin the car than the car is worth. Is worth,
yeah, absolutely.
(15:27):
So you take you, youyou take the Dejero EnGo home.
And at some pointa call is made to Sukh with an SOS.
Sukh, can you pick up this part of the story?
Yeah
so I get a call from Martin saying,mate, I'm in a bit of a pickle.
And I'm like,
(15:47):
oh yeah, what's happening? And,he was like, this is
This is what's happening.
We've lost all connectivity.We need some help.
Is there anything you can do to help us in in this scenario.
And I was like, yeah, absolutely.
Let's get you a GateWay.Let's get you EnGos.
Anything else you need,just let me know what you need,
and I'm happy to help any way we can.
(16:08):
And I'll throw it back to Martinbecause there was,
it's interesting to hear how he ended up
utilizing all of those additional
things.
Yeah, in waysyou wouldn't even imagine. So,
so what happenedis obviously, I took this machine home
and the graphics were running on greenfrom my house.
(16:28):
So that was the first thing.
That was before I called Sukh.
So I had to go home everysix hours to like make sure it was okay,
so I did a lot of driving.
And then it was okay,
that's problem one
sorted.
Problem two was (16:41):
we need connectivity generally
right at this pointbecause you know, we've got
we've got lots of systems that are downlots of systems that aren't going to work.
So the first thing he did was go,oh you know the EnGos can act as a Wi-Fi
hotspot, right?
And I went, sorry what?
(17:01):
And he said they can act as a hotspot.
So there you go.
I've got, you know,we eventually brought
the Aston machines backand I've got now two hotspots.
Brilliant. Okay.
I need a little more.
And then, Sukh, very kindly,
let us use a PathWay.
It was a GateWay. A GateWay, sorry. Yes.
It's all a way.
It all works, it's fine.
(17:24):
Sukh very kindly gave us a GateWay
to, to to to use.
Now, at this point, I'd startedgetting things back on their feet
broadcast wise.
And then I got the call of, hey, you know,you've got that dijuno thing?
It does that internet thing?
And I'm like, you mean Dejerothat we've been using in broadcasting?
(17:45):
Yeah, are you done with it? Yeah...
And actually then ended up runningthe returns department for a week.
So those are all of the returns.
And obviously we have so few,they just never happen.
But yeah, of course.
But they're a busy department
because people change their minds and,you know, people you know.
Yeah. So, they were running off of that.
(18:07):
And at one point,
customer service was running off it. Once,as everything was coming back online,
this poor GateWay was movingfrom team to team.
It went all around the building.
And its antennassort of like stuck on anything metal.
And it did a great job.
And then one of the EnGos
got drafted in servicebecause we have robotic picker robots.
(18:29):
So they're sort of likeRoombas, but they're huge.
And wegot to name them and I called one Eva.
So that's fun, right?
So Eva, you know, I was like, no Eva!
So these thing, thesethese robots weren't able to operate
because they neededto be connected to the server
and there were just big problems with that.
So we needed remote access help.
How did we do it?
(18:49):
So we then got the EnGo as a hotspot.
And then for about two days,the entire robotic picking system
was running off of an EnGo,which is just like mad to me.
Like, it sounds like, it sounds like made up,
but we were so, like desperateto get things connected and get things on.
(19:10):
We had a bunch of,
Vodafone called GigaCubes.
They're like little 5G modems.
And we were actually hurtingthe nearest cell tower.
So the fact the EnGos had multiple SIMsthat I could choose from
was so handy because it was like,oh, we are absolutely
like hitting this local Vodafone tower.There's an EE one.
(19:31):
Brilliant.
I've got good signalbecause even like we had EE hotspots as well.
And you know, they were doing their best.
But effectivelythat building's a Faraday cage.
The EnGo was able to crack it.
The EnGo was able to get way betterreception than that.
Victoria, you're in the middleof all of this crisis unfolding.
You guys are doingreally some MacGyvering,
not just for broadcast, but for productionand for robotics and for everything.
(19:56):
When do you
realize or when'sthe moment that you kind of goes aha
in your brain, where you realize,oh, this is actually working?
We're we're going to be okay.
Like, when did you feel like that?Oh, I don't know.
That was that was a long 3 or 4 weeks,to be honest with you.
And I just I just rememberwalking into the server room
(20:17):
and I see Sukh in there just puttingall these little antennas everywhere.
I was like, are you alright there?
What are you doing?
And he explained to me,and I was just like,
alright, we might we might be alright now.
We've got this. As soon as we started,as soon as we got one problem fixed
and we moved onto the next one,and we solved that problem close.
And we knew that that was okay,and we moved onto the next.
(20:39):
It just it seemed like a weightwas lifted off our shoulders
and we were just tickingticking the different problems off.
And yeah, it just
I don't know, I don't know
how it worked, but it did.
That's amazing.
So Sukh, of course, you worked with TJC andand different clients all the time.
(21:01):
And even with the best laid plans,
when it comes to live broadcast you,you have to expect the unexpected.
So talk to us about resiliencyand the robustness
of Dejero technology, which includesof course, Smart Blending Technology.
Yeah, absolutely.
So, being able to utilizeall of those different connections
(21:21):
that are available, like in this instance,you didn't have the fiber,
but being able to utilize multiplecellular networks
like Martin mentioned earlierabout hammering that Vodafone tower,
but we had the EE towers available or the O2.Being able to blend all that together
to get one resilient network,to get your robotics online,
to get your return systems online,even to get the
(21:44):
the return video feeds or whatany other sort of
for the live broadcast,but also for the technology
that you actually needed tofor the company to run
is all being utilized by that,that Smart Blending Technology.
Right?
That's that can give you that resiliencyover multiple networks
and almost guarantee you no downtime.
(22:06):
Victoria, you
mentioned Ideal World,you know, small budget.
You you've started only with one encoder.
So talk to me about launch day because
it wasn't it wasn't smooth sailing.
You know, it almost feels like somethingsomething challenging has to happen.
But then, oh man, it'sjust a complete success.
(22:27):
But that first day might be tough.Tell me about it.
Yeah.
So obviously, we acquired Ideal World.
We bought all of their kit and our management,because it was a big investment,
it was it was a big riskto buy the brand and trial it,
So theythey just gave us a single encoder leg,
and said we will, we'll get a B leg eventually.
(22:50):
Launch day comes. 6AM.
Me and Martin and had been there since 10PM
the night before.
And we moved from this studiothat I'm actually in now
to across across the road and 6AM
hits. We go live.
We're waiting around for a couple of hoursjust to make sure everything's okay.
9AM
(23:10):
the MD and some of the higher ups walkin and, we're having a chat with them.
And I just noticed on ouroutput, we're getting flickers of black,
and I looked at
Martin and I'm like, that'sthat's not meant to be doing that, is it?
And he's like, be quiet.We'll get it fixed.
And it's it's so,you don't want to on that launch day,
you really don't want to go backinto the other studio.
(23:32):
We've told our customerswe're building a new studio,
what we're going to offer them.
We want to prove that we can do this.
So we ended up using the EnGosand hot swapping them
every six hours or something like that.
And, and providing that to our
equipment hereas, as our B leg and we ran off
that. It was a, it was a problemwith the encoder that we had.
(23:54):
It was actually hardware.
So until we could get that resolved,
we could either golive with frames of black
or we we would have to move backto the other studio.
So having those two EnGos there and justhot swapping them every couple of hours,
sending it out and broadcasting. It really,it just gave us the the assurance that
that we needed because like like I said,
(24:15):
you really don't want to go back onsomething that you've committed to
and that you've said that you'regoing to provide to your customers.
We wanted to make sure that we could dothat.
I understand that at one pointthese EnGos were running for
many, many, many hours.
Yeah.
The first day, we we didn'teven think about it, to be honest.
I think we were so–
Because we'd been there all nightlaunching the new studio.
(24:38):
We just set the EnGo upand we left it for
Martin, how long was it?
It must have been on for 12 hoursat least.
Yeah, it was a long time.
Yeah, a long time.
And as Vic said, wewe were basically delirious at that point.
We were just like,I just need to go home.
And then it was, it was onlya few few hours. Well, it was next morning.
(24:59):
Someone went, has anyone rebootedthat poor EnGo? And I went, oh.
Yeah, it was a long time, a long time.
But the the great thing about it iswe could just log in at home.
So I used to, before
I was Broadcast Manager,I was on shift and I started at half five.
So every morning, I'd wake up at fiveand I wouldn't feel the need
to rush into work to reboot the EnGosbefore we go live at 6AM.
(25:23):
I just casually laid in bedand logged into the portal
and swapped them all over at home
so I didn't have to rush inand be here earlier than I needed to be.
It was just fantastic.
Well Sukh, you've been with Dejerofor a long time.
You know, something like seven years
You started as a Technical AccountManager before moving to sales.
So you, I think, wear two hats, from thetechnical to the relationship building.
(25:46):
And so I think what we can all agree with
is that noteverybody has a technical background.
So ensuring that
you navigate these complex
situations and offer solutionsfast in a simple way is really critical,
especially when you're dealingwith so many different types of teams.
Talk to us a little bit about,you know, how you work through that with,
(26:08):
you know, with, with this team here and,but all other potential customers.
Yeah, no. Absolutely.
So we've always designedall of our products around the user,
right?
And we always wanted to make it as simpleand seamless as possible
so that as Victoria said,she can literally just do it from home.
Right?
The fact that she doesn't have to go thereand be there at silly o'clock in the morning
(26:30):
to to just change it, to stop and startsomething.
It's. Yeah, it's a bit crazy, right?
But we've designed all of our equipment
around that like, one-touch operation.
So if it was our EnGos,you literally turn it on,
hit "go live" and you're live.
If it's with the GateWay, it's turn it on
and you have internet connectivityno matter where you are.
(26:51):
Right?
So we've always designed it around that.
So because we know thata lot of the users in the field
may not be technically minded. And,
and talkingoutside of the broadcast space,
say if we're talking to first respondersand things like that,
a lot of them won't be technically minded.
They don't want to be troubleshootinga router in the middle of a,
in the middle of an emergency situation.
(27:12):
They just need to have it turn onand it just works.
And they've got connectivity right.
And it's the same mindsetwe've always had in our broadcast industry
as well, to make it as easyand simple to use for our customers.
That's great.
So of course, TJC and Ideal
World stream 24/7,
so one connection is never enough.
(27:34):
I wonder how much time and resourcesdo you think
Dejero connectivity has helped TJC
and Ideal Worldsave over the past few years?
I mean, it's the amount of hassle
that it has saved us, and time.
Because time is money, right?
Also,when Sukh was saying about, you know,
(27:55):
no technical experts, I'm imaginingthe edit–you're going to cut to me
when you when you say that.
People with no technical expertiseand I just pop up,
because the truth is, is that, you know,
especially when you're,you know, joking aside, when you're
dealing with people who, you know, maybeyou've got a junior engineer on shift
(28:16):
and you want them to be able to
just handle a problem for you,
knowing that the product is simple to use,knowing that
the product is understandable.You know, we're not getting buried in.
So that saves time, right?Because that means I don't have to do it.
It means Vicki doesn't have to do it.
It means we don't have to do it for them.
They they can go into Dejero Control.
(28:37):
They can do whatever they need to do
and we never even get bothered.
So that that alone has saved
so much time. In terms of air time,
you know,if we hadn't been coding with the EnGos
and then eventually with a PathWay,if we hadn't got that, oh, we'd
been off air in that studio straight awayand the hassle of changing back, the money
we would have lost.
(28:59):
It doesn't bear thinking about.
So the good newsis, though, is that it was so easy for us
to decideto do what we eventually ended up doing.
It was like, well,we know this is gonna just work.
Having that relationshipwith a with a supplier
that goes beyond just,I buy a thing off you, you send it to me.
Done.
I know that if I have a problem,I can call Sukh,
(29:20):
and Sukh is probably gonna find some wayto help me out.
And as a result of that,we've bought a lot of stuff.
Not because we're just like bigfans of Sukh, although we are obviously,
I mean, not just because we're big fans,but because we know it's going to happen.
We know it's going to work.
I'm going to plug it in.
I'm going to stick a Cat 5 in the back.
(29:41):
You know, it's going to work.
I don't even have to worry about it.
It's a stress gone.
It's time saved.
It's money saved, really.
Because the amount of time spentconfiguring these things,
I know that it's gonna work.
I assign it to output 4.
In fact, I've even got a custom videothat's on output 4 so if
(30:02):
it ever does go down,
we can identify it quickly.
There's still stuff going to air.
And all of that was done
just because Sukh went, you knowyou can do this, right?
And I went, eh?
So, you know, there's
there's a lot of stuff like that as well,helping us explore the products
because a lot of companies could be like,well, you bought our thing now.
Thanks very much. Cheers bye.
You guys don't do that.
(30:23):
Even if, you know, we've had our WayPointand we've had our CuePoint forever,
and I'm still finding out new stuff,and you guys are still updating it,
and you guys are still supporting it.
And I think that's so important–that long term support
working with the customerand taking feedback as well.
So important.
So let's switch gears a bitbecause we focused a lot on hardware.
(30:45):
But you know, you've also takenadvantage of Dejero Live Plus app.
I wonder Victoria,
if you can talk a little bit about sort ofhow it's helped your company.
Yeah, of course.
So as I said previously,I joined mid Covid
and that was a time where the studiowas completely locked down.
It was only productionand minimal people in the warehouse.
(31:06):
Everyone else was working from home.
And to try and minimize any like problemsin, in production,
we, we weren't allowed any remote guests.
We weren't allowed any experts,anything like that.
And TJC really relies on that.
And at the time it was just TJC,but Ideal World
now, they also rely on it. Because it'sreally important to show our customers
(31:27):
where we get these products fromand how we sourced really good deals and
and get really good, like expert advicefrom the people that are making them.
So we've been like every day,
there are multiple hours of our 24 hourbroadcast where we use Dejero Live
Plus. I mean that it's got to be honestly
at least 12 hours a day overboth channels.
(31:50):
It's it's a big amount of timethat we use,
and it's allowed us to get peoplefrom Australia and New Zealand and America
who it cost a lot of money
for them to come over herejust to talk for an hour or two.
So yeah, every daywe have experts coming on
and it really helpsbecause we get live techs into the studio
as well from customersso that the presenters can address that.
(32:12):
And just giving the customersa way to interact with the people
that are either manufacturing the productsor creating them,
it really helps answer their questionsand give them that peace of mind
when they don't want to.
You don't want to forget Tony in Brazil.
He was ahe was our guinea pig.
Oh actually, I think Martin,
you were our guinea pig because in Covid–I was! Yeah in Covid, we were wondering
(32:35):
what would happen if no one was allowedin the office, like not even production.
And because where is the sales channel?
There's no sales if we're not on it.
So Martin, actually at 1 in the morning,sold some hand sanitizer from his house
in his back room with Dejero LivePlus app.
I sold 250 of them bad boys.
(32:55):
Yeah. Oh, did you actually?
Yeah. That's hilarious.
Here's the thing–
That's not a badge of honor because it washand sanitizer during Covid.
Like
you know, it was going to sell well.
Come on. That's still amazing.
That's amazing. That was fun. Yeah.
And and I was even, like, remote controllingthe vision mixer and stuff.
So I was doing everything, but
(33:16):
using the Live Plus app,which was new to us.
But even then, we discovered it's
pretty easy to set up, you know?
Yeah, exactly.
Like like Martin touched on earlier,
we don't have engineers on site 24/7,so I don't particularly love
getting phone calls at 3AM saying,oh, we've got a guest
that's supposed to come onand they can't connect.
(33:37):
And every single member of our team,no matter how like advanced
they are in technical knowledge or not,they can remote into Dejero,
they can look at the settings.It's so user friendly.
And like I say, we're setting people up in–I rang someone,
I've rung this
lady to set her up and I said,do you have an Apple or an Android phone?
(33:58):
And she said, I don't know.
So I had to set her up with the
Dejero Live Plus app, and she didn't knowwhat type of phone she had.
She still managed to set it up.
She still went to air and it was great.
What did she have? I need to know.
I'm going to guess an Apple.
No one knows.
(34:21):
You know, it's been so interestingchatting with you guys.
So maybe we wrap it up with sort of,
you've tried so many different things,and I bet there's still more to do.
So what does success look like for TJC,
for Ideal World, and for Dejero too. Maybe
we'll start with Sukhand sort of then work down
Victoria and Martin.
Yeah I guess success for for us isDejero is always
(34:45):
making sure we've got happy customers.
Right?
Being there when things don't gohow it's supposed to
go, and always being there to helpresolve those issues and just being there,
right?
And like, like you guys said, Canadian company,we're just we're nice.
Just being there to actually really helpresolve any kind of issues
or technical issues that you may have,
(35:06):
even if it's with our equipment or notwith our equipment.
But always happy to help and happy to dowhatever we can. And innovate, of course,
right? And innovate of course. Yeah.
How about yourself, Martin?
So you know that there's a reasonthat there's two of us, right?
This because I'm moving on to somethingelse.
(35:26):
And I'm very much looking forwardto my new challenge, you know, elsewhere.
But I'm heading over to Victoria.
So one of the things that I've been proudof is I've left the studio with Dejero,
and it's in good shape.
You know, I'm not worriedthat the particularly Dejero technology
isn't going to be somethingthat Victoria can handle
because she's brilliant anyway.
(35:47):
Just put it out there.
Otherwise next time I see her,she'll roast me for that one.
But but being able to
give that technology to her and go right.
You know,
Dejero and I think we talkedabout Dejero for about–
and this is in the best possible way,
I think we've talked about Dejerofor about three minutes
because I think the conversation endedwith, yeah, it just works.
(36:10):
It just works.
So success for TJC
is going to be keeping the customerentertained,
keeping it innovative,keeping it different, being different
with our competition.
I think Dejero is reallygiving us the edge in that over the last,
you know what have we've been a customer forwhat, five, six years now?
(36:31):
It's it's given us an edge
that other people in the market
can't do with technologythat just works with resiliency
that's there. It's been brilliant for us.
How about yourself, Victoria?
Oh, God.
What's next?
Well we're moving facility in 2026.
So we've just we have just built a studioacross the road.
It launched in June this year.
(36:51):
We have just renovated the studio here.
And now we're going to movecompletely new facility in 2026.
And we're going to be buildingfour studios there.
We will have our two main studiosand two DR studios,
and it will be for TJC and Ideal World.
So that's, that's the next big leap for methat I need to start
planning,because 2026 will come around in no time.
(37:14):
Absolutely.
And I'll be here to help youevery step of the way,
wherever I can.
Thank Sukh. Well, thanks so much to all ofyou, Martin, Victoria and of course Sukh.
This was so much fun.
Thank you very much, everyone.
Thank you.
Thank you for having us.Thank you so much.
For more information about How Dejerois bringing resilient connectivity
to broadcasters around the world,or to book a demo
(37:36):
and learn more about our newproducts, head to dejero.com.
But we knew,
okay, well, if I get a PathWay fromDejero, it'll work because it's Dejero.
It always works.
It always works.
Having that relationship with awith a supplier that goes beyond
just I buy a thing off you,you send it to me.
Done.
I know that if I have a problem,I can call Sukh. And Sukh
is probably gonna find some wayto help me out.
And as a result of that,we've bought a lot of stuff.
(00:26):
Not because we just like big fans of Sukh,although we are obviously,
and not just because we're big fans.Because we know what's going to happen.
We know it's going to work. I'mgoing to plug it in.
I'm going to stick a Cat 5 in the backand you know, it's going to work.
I don't even have to worry about it.
It's a stress gone.
It's time saved.
It's money saved really.
(00:57):
Welcome to
Critical Connections,
a podcast that featuresthe stories of the people and companies
helping to make our communitiesconnected, informed and stylish!
From sparkling beginnings to radiantfutures, the journey of the British Home
Shopping Network includesTJC and Ideal World. Since then, it's become
a giant in the UK's onlineretail landscape.
(01:20):
In addition to its website, TJC featuresan engaging live TV shopping network
reaching more than 30 million homesin the UK and the Republic of Ireland.
Joining me now
from the UK are Broadcast ManagersMartin Willingham and Victoria Roche.
He's been with the company for nine years,
so he lives and breathes video productionand live broadcast.
(01:41):
Welcome, Martin and Victoria. Hello. Hi.
Thank you. Thank you for having us.
Also joining us is Sukh Grewal,a Sales Account Manager with Dejero.
Sukh is a solutions troubleshooterand a deeply passionate
professional solvingconnectivity problems.
Happy to have you with us for this one.
(02:02):
Happy to be here. Thanks for having me.
Okay, let's jump right in.
For those who are not familiar with TJC,
tell us about the organizationand what has made it so successful.
So TJC has been around
in the UK now since 2006.
It's part of the bigger VGL group.
(02:22):
So VGL started by supplying– so many ofthe high street or like shopping mall
retailers likely carrysomething from the VGL Group,
and it was decided in about 2005, 2006
that we were going to skipall that and sell direct to our customers.
And the way the Chairman thought was goingto work out was by shopping television.
(02:44):
TJC was started in the UK.
We've got our colleagues atShop LC in America and our
newest, the baby of the bunch,which is Shop LC in Germany.
So there was a TJC in Germany.
Obviously, the financial recession hitthat went away because it,
you know, it needed some changes.
And now we reentered the German marketand we're doing quite well there.
So we're quite happy.
(03:05):
So yeah.And that Ideal World was an acquisition.
Ideal World is a 24 year plus old brandthat's been going in the UK.
You know,
You know, one of the leadersin the shopping television world here
and they had some trouble a few years
back, you know, various ownersand stuff like that.
So we were very pleasedwhen the opportunity
(03:27):
came to us to rescue that brand,bring it back,
make it in our image,make it in our style.
And we're very pleasedwith the two offerings
we have in the UK, Shop LCin the US and Shop LC in Germany as well.
So the group's getting quite big,we're getting quite ambitious,
but it's really exciting toto have been a part of it at least,
you know, for the last nine years.To see all the changes over the years,
(03:48):
I mean, let's start with you first,Victoria, tell us a little bit about what
it used to be, even just a few years ago,and sort of where we are today.
Yeah
so I joined TJC four years agoand it was in the peak of Covid.
So TJC was very different then.We had a lot of buyers, suppliers,
a lot of expert gueststhat would always come into the studio,
(04:09):
and during Covid that wasn't allowed.
So we changed thethe way we completely operate doing that.
So obviouslyusing yourselves with Dejero,
we got a lot of remote guests inthrough the app.
And then we expandedand now we travel all around the world.
We've done OBs in Bangkok, India,
Tucson, Verona, all over the world.
(04:31):
And that was just not somethingthat was on the cards four years ago.
And obviouslyacquiring Ideal World as well.
That was a completely different landscapeto how it was four years ago as well.
So, I mean, me and Martin, and we've we'vedecommissioned three studios, we've built
two brand new ones, and we're lookingto move facilities again soon.
So it is an ever changing landscape.
(04:52):
It's wild to me that so much can happenin one year, never mind five years.
And of course, Martin, you've beenwith the organization since 2015,
so even more changes for you.
Yeah, it's the amount of changesthat we've had.
When I first started, it was a little bit,you know, kind of wild there.
You know, it was we had a lot of fun.
(05:15):
But if you were making, you know, 4
or 5000 pounds an hour,you were high fiving, you know,
we we've had this big change in a marketthat people perceived as getting smaller.
We've only grown.
And obviously Covid did changekind of everything for us, really.
But before that as well,the sort of the growth
(05:37):
that we've managed to sustain,has been quite impressive really.
And I think it's because,you know, our operation is cost effective.
We're very sensible with thewith the with the money.
And also we are giving our customersthe sort of products they need.
And also, you know,we're here to talk with you guys.
So going all around the worldand showing our customers,
(05:59):
hey, you know, wewe talk about this Vicenza Gem Fair.
Well here we are.
We talk about Tucson Gem Fair.
Here we are, you know.
Oh what's that?You're buying a patch of spa products.
Well, here we are in a spa. Right.
So all of these things,
I've shown our customer for.
I remember the first onewe did in Tucson,
and people were askingif it was green screen.
(06:20):
We had to get Chris up thereto walk through cactus to prove that
no, we are actually here.
Did he stung by any of that cactus?
Unfortunately he didn't.
I love that. Because that would have madea great story.
Good for him.
But I love Chris.
I like winding him up.
It's like my favorite,my favorite game is just to, like,
(06:44):
you know, play play on hima little bit, so he, yeah,
but we had to we had to get him to do itbecause they just didn't believe
that we actually went there.
Because shopping networks don't do this,right?
Shopping networks don't do it because,
you know, traditionally, if you have,you'd have to have massive budgets.
A truck, a SAT link,
you know, in the UK, a line to tower,which we have for other reasons.
(07:05):
But like all of that,all those bookings, doing
all that stuff,it gets super cost prohibitive.
Whereas Dejerohas allowed us to actually go
to these places and do it,you know, without spending a ton of money,
but still providing quality outputthat looks good as well
because it makes, you know, even if,you know, we do a show and the sales
(07:26):
are ho hum.
Optically, it's fantastic to sayto the customers, hey, we're here,
you know. Well, let me pick up on thatbecause the evolution of TJ includes
Dejero and the storyis actually really interesting.
TJC wanted to take its live auction styleprograming outside of the studio.
You mentioned that, to locationsaround the world, ushering in really a new
(07:47):
era for the production and broadcastingof tele shopping shows. So
talk to us about the idea and
then Dejero, whatit was able to helping you to achieve,
through this new way of doing television,if you will.
Yeah. So,
it was weird because the US had alreadystarted using Dejero.
(08:10):
They had already acquireda couple of EnGos, which are a little bit
long in the tooth now,but they're still going.
And we said, okay,now we want to get in on this. Now,
we did trial a thing a few years before
where we did it in like a really,
kind of budget way.
They tried to doing it over like,you know, VoIP
(08:32):
type servicesto try and do it in a cost effective way.
But of course, that that's not resilient.
And it wasn't very great quality.
And, you know, so we said, hey,we want to do it.
And my colleague in the States, Joe, said,hey, get this.
So we got it with, you know,honestly pretty little expectations.
It was okay,well we'll see how this thing goes.
(08:53):
And then Sukh actually came inand, trained all of us,
and he just had, you know,I think 6 or 7 people just staring at him
like... trying to understand.
I still remember that day.
Yeah. Yeah,I'm sure all of trying to be like What,
So what's this thing do? What's this or?
How's this going to help ourtele shopping? You know,
and then we suddenly figured it out when,Rich and I,
(09:17):
Rich is one of the engineers,
we got thrown on a plane.And it was, right,
you're going to Tucson, and you're going today.
And we were like, oh, I better get my case
then. And
poor old Rich as well,
terrified of flying.
So turbulence happened.
He grips the seatand doesn't talk for an hour.
(09:39):
He's pauses his movie, and he's like...
Oh. So, yeah, we gotwe got taken off to Tucson,
and from there it was, okay,we can do this.
We can do it anywhere.
And suddenly we're going,well, where's the next one going to be?
And then we started doing Italy.
We've done a ton in Italy.
Italian designers, Italian jewelryand so a ton of stuff there.
(10:02):
So the, the growthof the amount of products we have from you
guys has changed because we've gone, oh,we can have this.
Oh, wouldn't it be niceif we had this, you know,
and it started with like, you know, we,
we had a WayPoint and a couple of EnGosand it was well, return
video would be good on these things.
The YouTube feed's like 30s delayed.
(10:23):
Oh, oh funny, youguys offer this thing called CuePoint. Ah!
So every time we run into a problem,there's been a solution.
And a solution that's,you know, suited our budget quite nicely.
So would you say, Victoria, that, sortof the connectivity solutions have made
something that would have been impossiblebefore for TJC a real possibility?
(10:46):
Absolutely.
I think if we don't just
talk about the OB there, if we talk aboutjust our day to day operations,
Dejero actually provides,since we acquired Ideal World,
it's in a different site.
So all of our transmissioncomes from the TJC studios.
But the Ideal World
studios are across the roadand Dejero offers our B leg there.
So if anything goes downwith our main encoders,
(11:06):
which unfortunately has happeneda few times,
Dejero is there,the connectivity is reliable
and we just knowthat we can always trust it.
And I think that it's just opened upso many possibilities, not just traveling,
but just having that security on siteto always provide– We're shopping
tele at the end of the day. If we're not onair, we're not making money.
(11:26):
And it's so important for usto be able to be on air all the time.
And having that connectivityand knowing that it's safe and reliable
just opens upso many more possibilities for us.
Yeah,
you know, and it's interesting
because I think a lot of organizations,including yours, has,
you know, not just your broadcastfacilities, fiber networks,
you know, just a network in generalto be able to support your different,
(11:49):
you know, activities.
But sometimes the inevitable happens.
And for you at TJC in 2023,
for a period of days,these fixed lines were compromised.
So tell us how you used then, Dero,to help facilitate
what I can only imaginewas a nightmare of days.
(12:11):
Yeah.
Actually, I got corrected on itthe other day.
Just so you know, it was 2022because I thought it was a year prior.
I've,
because I've aged. That's what happened.
I aged.
There's some gray in the beard.I've trimmed the beard.
Because again, when you see the,
the salt and pepper going on herebecause– Hahaha try to block it out, block it out.
Right, I mean, you saw me on Friday,
(12:34):
and that is a manwho has been stressed.
So yeah, we actually lost,
a lot of connectivity into the building
and there was a bit of panic from ITwho started pulling Cat 5s
out of patch panels and stuff,and I'm like, please don't touch anything.
But they were pulling stuff out.
So we had one of our linesinto the building
(12:56):
just go.
And to this day
we've never figured outwhat actually really happened there.
But it kind of, it really made a mess.
A lot of static IPs were lost and stuff,stuff sort of stopped working.
So my first moment there,my first priority was,
oh, goodness.
(13:16):
How do I get all this stuff back on air?
So the first thing that got affectedand the first way that Dejero helped us out,
this is this is even beforeI picked up the phone to Sukh because,
you know, that happened as well.
So the first thing we did was,okay, there's a
there's a saying in tele shopping,which is no L,
(13:37):
no sell. Right?
If you don't have that graphic bar,you know, on the left,
you're not selling anything. So obviously,
we actually– The whole
back end was, was sort of offline, right?
But the whole back end was gone.
So we were actually manuallytaking orders by hand
(13:59):
and catching up, which we did do,and we didn't miss any
and we got some happy customers.
But we briefly used
a Microsoft PowerPointto generate our graphics, which yeah,
you know, it functioned.Wow, that's incredible!
So, yeah.
and that was quite funny.
The producer's going,okay, are you keyed off yet?
We'll exit the slideshow, change the title.
(14:21):
So what had happenedwas we had these Aston machines,
so we use Aston graphicsto generate that that L.
It's massively like overkill for itbecause they do like A/R studios.
What are we doing?We just put that little L on.
But they're very good for the job.
And we've got a guy called Michaelwho is just amazing with them.
I wentright, I know where I've got connectivity.
(14:42):
I've got connectivity at home.
So luckily, I'm very lucky to livein an area that's got amazing fiber.
So I've got really good speed.
Even if I didn't though,
you know, I would've probably still been okay.
So I kidnapped an Aston machineand I kidnapped an EnGo.
And I was sat there and I was thinking,oh.
(15:05):
And with the MD at the time,a guy called Srikant, he's going,
oh I could take this machine homeand get the graphics running from there.
And he goes,why are you still sat here? Move.
Move, like go.
So then I loaded all this stuffinto my old car, which is great. You know,
you know, it's great
when you've got more value of equipmentin the car than the car is worth. Is worth,
yeah, absolutely.
(15:27):
So you take you, youyou take the Dejero EnGo home.
And at some pointa call is made to Sukh with an SOS.
Sukh, can you pick up this part of the story?
Yeah
so I get a call from Martin saying,mate, I'm in a bit of a pickle.
And I'm like,
(15:47):
oh yeah, what's happening? And,he was like, this is
This is what's happening.
We've lost all connectivity.We need some help.
Is there anything you can do to help us in in this scenario.
And I was like, yeah, absolutely.
Let's get you a GateWay.Let's get you EnGos.
Anything else you need,just let me know what you need,
and I'm happy to help any way we can.
(16:08):
And I'll throw it back to Martinbecause there was,
it's interesting to hear how he ended up
utilizing all of those additional
things.
Yeah, in waysyou wouldn't even imagine. So,
so what happenedis obviously, I took this machine home
and the graphics were running on greenfrom my house.
(16:28):
So that was the first thing.
That was before I called Sukh.
So I had to go home everysix hours to like make sure it was okay,
so I did a lot of driving.
And then it was okay,
that's problem one
sorted.
Problem two was (16:41):
we need connectivity generally
right at this pointbecause you know, we've got
we've got lots of systems that are downlots of systems that aren't going to work.
So the first thing he did was go,oh you know the EnGos can act as a Wi-Fi
hotspot, right?
And I went, sorry what?
(17:01):
And he said they can act as a hotspot.
So there you go.
I've got, you know,we eventually brought
the Aston machines backand I've got now two hotspots.
Brilliant. Okay.
I need a little more.
And then, Sukh, very kindly,
let us use a PathWay.
It was a GateWay. A GateWay, sorry. Yes.
It's all a way.
It all works, it's fine.
(17:24):
Sukh very kindly gave us a GateWay
to, to to to use.
Now, at this point, I'd startedgetting things back on their feet
broadcast wise.
And then I got the call of, hey, you know,you've got that dijuno thing?
It does that internet thing?
And I'm like, you mean Dejerothat we've been using in broadcasting?
(17:45):
Yeah, are you done with it? Yeah...
And actually then ended up runningthe returns department for a week.
So those are all of the returns.
And obviously we have so few,they just never happen.
But yeah, of course.
But they're a busy department
because people change their minds and,you know, people you know.
Yeah. So, they were running off of that.
(18:07):
And at one point,
customer service was running off it. Once,as everything was coming back online,
this poor GateWay was movingfrom team to team.
It went all around the building.
And its antennassort of like stuck on anything metal.
And it did a great job.
And then one of the EnGos
got drafted in servicebecause we have robotic picker robots.
(18:29):
So they're sort of likeRoombas, but they're huge.
And wegot to name them and I called one Eva.
So that's fun, right?
So Eva, you know, I was like, no Eva!
So these thing, thesethese robots weren't able to operate
because they neededto be connected to the server
and there were just big problems with that.
So we needed remote access help.
How did we do it?
(18:49):
So we then got the EnGo as a hotspot.
And then for about two days,the entire robotic picking system
was running off of an EnGo,which is just like mad to me.
Like, it sounds like, it sounds like made up,
but we were so, like desperateto get things connected and get things on.
(19:10):
We had a bunch of,
Vodafone called GigaCubes.
They're like little 5G modems.
And we were actually hurtingthe nearest cell tower.
So the fact the EnGos had multiple SIMsthat I could choose from
was so handy because it was like,oh, we are absolutely
like hitting this local Vodafone tower.There's an EE one.
(19:31):
Brilliant.
I've got good signalbecause even like we had EE hotspots as well.
And you know, they were doing their best.
But effectivelythat building's a Faraday cage.
The EnGo was able to crack it.
The EnGo was able to get way betterreception than that.
Victoria, you're in the middleof all of this crisis unfolding.
You guys are doingreally some MacGyvering,
not just for broadcast, but for productionand for robotics and for everything.
(19:56):
When do you
realize or when'sthe moment that you kind of goes aha
in your brain, where you realize,oh, this is actually working?
We're we're going to be okay.
Like, when did you feel like that?Oh, I don't know.
That was that was a long 3 or 4 weeks,to be honest with you.
And I just I just rememberwalking into the server room
(20:17):
and I see Sukh in there just puttingall these little antennas everywhere.
I was like, are you alright there?
What are you doing?
And he explained to me,and I was just like,
alright, we might we might be alright now.
We've got this. As soon as we started,as soon as we got one problem fixed
and we moved onto the next one,and we solved that problem close.
And we knew that that was okay,and we moved onto the next.
(20:39):
It just it seemed like a weightwas lifted off our shoulders
and we were just tickingticking the different problems off.
And yeah, it just
I don't know, I don't know
how it worked, but it did.
That's amazing.
So Sukh, of course, you worked with TJC andand different clients all the time.
(21:01):
And even with the best laid plans,
when it comes to live broadcast you,you have to expect the unexpected.
So talk to us about resiliencyand the robustness
of Dejero technology, which includesof course, Smart Blending Technology.
Yeah, absolutely.
So, being able to utilizeall of those different connections
(21:21):
that are available, like in this instance,you didn't have the fiber,
but being able to utilize multiplecellular networks
like Martin mentioned earlierabout hammering that Vodafone tower,
but we had the EE towers available or the O2.Being able to blend all that together
to get one resilient network,to get your robotics online,
to get your return systems online,even to get the
(21:44):
the return video feeds or whatany other sort of
for the live broadcast,but also for the technology
that you actually needed tofor the company to run
is all being utilized by that,that Smart Blending Technology.
Right?
That's that can give you that resiliencyover multiple networks
and almost guarantee you no downtime.
(22:06):
Victoria, you
mentioned Ideal World,you know, small budget.
You you've started only with one encoder.
So talk to me about launch day because
it wasn't it wasn't smooth sailing.
You know, it almost feels like somethingsomething challenging has to happen.
But then, oh man, it'sjust a complete success.
(22:27):
But that first day might be tough.Tell me about it.
Yeah.
So obviously, we acquired Ideal World.
We bought all of their kit and our management,because it was a big investment,
it was it was a big riskto buy the brand and trial it,
So theythey just gave us a single encoder leg,
and said we will, we'll get a B leg eventually.
(22:50):
Launch day comes. 6AM.
Me and Martin and had been there since 10PM
the night before.
And we moved from this studiothat I'm actually in now
to across across the road and 6AM
hits. We go live.
We're waiting around for a couple of hoursjust to make sure everything's okay.
9AM
(23:10):
the MD and some of the higher ups walkin and, we're having a chat with them.
And I just noticed on ouroutput, we're getting flickers of black,
and I looked at
Martin and I'm like, that'sthat's not meant to be doing that, is it?
And he's like, be quiet.We'll get it fixed.
And it's it's so,you don't want to on that launch day,
you really don't want to go backinto the other studio.
(23:32):
We've told our customerswe're building a new studio,
what we're going to offer them.
We want to prove that we can do this.
So we ended up using the EnGosand hot swapping them
every six hours or something like that.
And, and providing that to our
equipment hereas, as our B leg and we ran off
that. It was a, it was a problemwith the encoder that we had.
(23:54):
It was actually hardware.
So until we could get that resolved,
we could either golive with frames of black
or we we would have to move backto the other studio.
So having those two EnGos there and justhot swapping them every couple of hours,
sending it out and broadcasting. It really,it just gave us the the assurance that
that we needed because like like I said,
(24:15):
you really don't want to go back onsomething that you've committed to
and that you've said that you'regoing to provide to your customers.
We wanted to make sure that we could dothat.
I understand that at one pointthese EnGos were running for
many, many, many hours.
Yeah.
The first day, we we didn'teven think about it, to be honest.
I think we were so–
Because we'd been there all nightlaunching the new studio.
(24:38):
We just set the EnGo upand we left it for
Martin, how long was it?
It must have been on for 12 hoursat least.
Yeah, it was a long time.
Yeah, a long time.
And as Vic said, wewe were basically delirious at that point.
We were just like,I just need to go home.
And then it was, it was onlya few few hours. Well, it was next morning.
(24:59):
Someone went, has anyone rebootedthat poor EnGo? And I went, oh.
Yeah, it was a long time, a long time.
But the the great thing about it iswe could just log in at home.
So I used to, before
I was Broadcast Manager,I was on shift and I started at half five.
So every morning, I'd wake up at fiveand I wouldn't feel the need
to rush into work to reboot the EnGosbefore we go live at 6AM.
(25:23):
I just casually laid in bedand logged into the portal
and swapped them all over at home
so I didn't have to rush inand be here earlier than I needed to be.
It was just fantastic.
Well Sukh, you've been with Dejerofor a long time.
You know, something like seven years
You started as a Technical AccountManager before moving to sales.
So you, I think, wear two hats, from thetechnical to the relationship building.
(25:46):
And so I think what we can all agree with
is that noteverybody has a technical background.
So ensuring that
you navigate these complex
situations and offer solutionsfast in a simple way is really critical,
especially when you're dealingwith so many different types of teams.
Talk to us a little bit about,you know, how you work through that with,
(26:08):
you know, with, with this team here and,but all other potential customers.
Yeah, no. Absolutely.
So we've always designedall of our products around the user,
right?
And we always wanted to make it as simpleand seamless as possible
so that as Victoria said,she can literally just do it from home.
Right?
The fact that she doesn't have to go thereand be there at silly o'clock in the morning
(26:30):
to to just change it, to stop and startsomething.
It's. Yeah, it's a bit crazy, right?
But we've designed all of our equipment
around that like, one-touch operation.
So if it was our EnGos,you literally turn it on,
hit "go live" and you're live.
If it's with the GateWay, it's turn it on
and you have internet connectivityno matter where you are.
(26:51):
Right?
So we've always designed it around that.
So because we know thata lot of the users in the field
may not be technically minded. And,
and talkingoutside of the broadcast space,
say if we're talking to first respondersand things like that,
a lot of them won't be technically minded.
They don't want to be troubleshootinga router in the middle of a,
in the middle of an emergency situation.
(27:12):
They just need to have it turn onand it just works.
And they've got connectivity right.
And it's the same mindsetwe've always had in our broadcast industry
as well, to make it as easyand simple to use for our customers.
That's great.
So of course, TJC and Ideal
World stream 24/7,
so one connection is never enough.
(27:34):
I wonder how much time and resourcesdo you think
Dejero connectivity has helped TJC
and Ideal Worldsave over the past few years?
I mean, it's the amount of hassle
that it has saved us, and time.
Because time is money, right?
Also,when Sukh was saying about, you know,
(27:55):
no technical experts, I'm imaginingthe edit–you're going to cut to me
when you when you say that.
People with no technical expertiseand I just pop up,
because the truth is, is that, you know,
especially when you're,you know, joking aside, when you're
dealing with people who, you know, maybeyou've got a junior engineer on shift
(28:16):
and you want them to be able to
just handle a problem for you,
knowing that the product is simple to use,knowing that
the product is understandable.You know, we're not getting buried in.
So that saves time, right?Because that means I don't have to do it.
It means Vicki doesn't have to do it.
It means we don't have to do it for them.
They they can go into Dejero Control.
(28:37):
They can do whatever they need to do
and we never even get bothered.
So that that alone has saved
so much time. In terms of air time,
you know,if we hadn't been coding with the EnGos
and then eventually with a PathWay,if we hadn't got that, oh, we'd
been off air in that studio straight awayand the hassle of changing back, the money
we would have lost.
(28:59):
It doesn't bear thinking about.
So the good newsis, though, is that it was so easy for us
to decideto do what we eventually ended up doing.
It was like, well,we know this is gonna just work.
Having that relationshipwith a with a supplier
that goes beyond just,I buy a thing off you, you send it to me.
Done.
I know that if I have a problem,I can call Sukh,
(29:20):
and Sukh is probably gonna find some wayto help me out.
And as a result of that,we've bought a lot of stuff.
Not because we're just like bigfans of Sukh, although we are obviously,
I mean, not just because we're big fans,but because we know it's going to happen.
We know it's going to work.
I'm going to plug it in.
I'm going to stick a Cat 5 in the back.
(29:41):
You know, it's going to work.
I don't even have to worry about it.
It's a stress gone.
It's time saved.
It's money saved, really.
Because the amount of time spentconfiguring these things,
I know that it's gonna work.
I assign it to output 4.
In fact, I've even got a custom videothat's on output 4 so if
(30:02):
it ever does go down,
we can identify it quickly.
There's still stuff going to air.
And all of that was done
just because Sukh went, you knowyou can do this, right?
And I went, eh?
So, you know, there's
there's a lot of stuff like that as well,helping us explore the products
because a lot of companies could be like,well, you bought our thing now.
Thanks very much. Cheers bye.
You guys don't do that.
(30:23):
Even if, you know, we've had our WayPointand we've had our CuePoint forever,
and I'm still finding out new stuff,and you guys are still updating it,
and you guys are still supporting it.
And I think that's so important–that long term support
working with the customerand taking feedback as well.
So important.
So let's switch gears a bitbecause we focused a lot on hardware.
(30:45):
But you know, you've also takenadvantage of Dejero Live Plus app.
I wonder Victoria,
if you can talk a little bit about sort ofhow it's helped your company.
Yeah, of course.
So as I said previously,I joined mid Covid
and that was a time where the studiowas completely locked down.
It was only productionand minimal people in the warehouse.
(31:06):
Everyone else was working from home.
And to try and minimize any like problemsin, in production,
we, we weren't allowed any remote guests.
We weren't allowed any experts,anything like that.
And TJC really relies on that.
And at the time it was just TJC,but Ideal World
now, they also rely on it. Because it'sreally important to show our customers
(31:27):
where we get these products fromand how we sourced really good deals and
and get really good, like expert advicefrom the people that are making them.
So we've been like every day,
there are multiple hours of our 24 hourbroadcast where we use Dejero Live
Plus. I mean that it's got to be honestly
at least 12 hours a day overboth channels.
(31:50):
It's it's a big amount of timethat we use,
and it's allowed us to get peoplefrom Australia and New Zealand and America
who it cost a lot of money
for them to come over herejust to talk for an hour or two.
So yeah, every daywe have experts coming on
and it really helpsbecause we get live techs into the studio
as well from customersso that the presenters can address that.
(32:12):
And just giving the customersa way to interact with the people
that are either manufacturing the productsor creating them,
it really helps answer their questionsand give them that peace of mind
when they don't want to.
You don't want to forget Tony in Brazil.
He was ahe was our guinea pig.
Oh actually, I think Martin,
you were our guinea pig because in Covid–I was! Yeah in Covid, we were wondering
(32:35):
what would happen if no one was allowedin the office, like not even production.
And because where is the sales channel?
There's no sales if we're not on it.
So Martin, actually at 1 in the morning,sold some hand sanitizer from his house
in his back room with Dejero LivePlus app.
I sold 250 of them bad boys.
(32:55):
Yeah. Oh, did you actually?
Yeah. That's hilarious.
Here's the thing–
That's not a badge of honor because it washand sanitizer during Covid.
Like
you know, it was going to sell well.
Come on. That's still amazing.
That's amazing. That was fun. Yeah.
And and I was even, like, remote controllingthe vision mixer and stuff.
So I was doing everything, but
(33:16):
using the Live Plus app,which was new to us.
But even then, we discovered it's
pretty easy to set up, you know?
Yeah, exactly.
Like like Martin touched on earlier,
we don't have engineers on site 24/7,so I don't particularly love
getting phone calls at 3AM saying,oh, we've got a guest
that's supposed to come onand they can't connect.
(33:37):
And every single member of our team,no matter how like advanced
they are in technical knowledge or not,they can remote into Dejero,
they can look at the settings.It's so user friendly.
And like I say, we're setting people up in–I rang someone,
I've rung this
lady to set her up and I said,do you have an Apple or an Android phone?
(33:58):
And she said, I don't know.
So I had to set her up with the
Dejero Live Plus app, and she didn't knowwhat type of phone she had.
She still managed to set it up.
She still went to air and it was great.
What did she have? I need to know.
I'm going to guess an Apple.
No one knows.
(34:21):
You know, it's been so interestingchatting with you guys.
So maybe we wrap it up with sort of,
you've tried so many different things,and I bet there's still more to do.
So what does success look like for TJC,
for Ideal World, and for Dejero too. Maybe
we'll start with Sukhand sort of then work down
Victoria and Martin.
Yeah I guess success for for us isDejero is always
(34:45):
making sure we've got happy customers.
Right?
Being there when things don't gohow it's supposed to
go, and always being there to helpresolve those issues and just being there,
right?
And like, like you guys said, Canadian company,we're just we're nice.
Just being there to actually really helpresolve any kind of issues
or technical issues that you may have,
(35:06):
even if it's with our equipment or notwith our equipment.
But always happy to help and happy to dowhatever we can. And innovate, of course,
right? And innovate of course. Yeah.
How about yourself, Martin?
So you know that there's a reasonthat there's two of us, right?
This because I'm moving on to somethingelse.
(35:26):
And I'm very much looking forwardto my new challenge, you know, elsewhere.
But I'm heading over to Victoria.
So one of the things that I've been proudof is I've left the studio with Dejero,
and it's in good shape.
You know, I'm not worriedthat the particularly Dejero technology
isn't going to be somethingthat Victoria can handle
because she's brilliant anyway.
(35:47):
Just put it out there.
Otherwise next time I see her,she'll roast me for that one.
But but being able to
give that technology to her and go right.
You know,
Dejero and I think we talkedabout Dejero for about–
and this is in the best possible way,
I think we've talked about Dejerofor about three minutes
because I think the conversation endedwith, yeah, it just works.
(36:10):
It just works.
So success for TJC
is going to be keeping the customerentertained,
keeping it innovative,keeping it different, being different
with our competition.
I think Dejero is reallygiving us the edge in that over the last,
you know what have we've been a customer forwhat, five, six years now?
(36:31):
It's it's given us an edge
that other people in the market
can't do with technologythat just works with resiliency
that's there. It's been brilliant for us.
How about yourself, Victoria?
Oh, God.
What's next?
Well we're moving facility in 2026.
So we've just we have just built a studioacross the road.
It launched in June this year.
(36:51):
We have just renovated the studio here.
And now we're going to movecompletely new facility in 2026.
And we're going to be buildingfour studios there.
We will have our two main studiosand two DR studios,
and it will be for TJC and Ideal World.
So that's, that's the next big leap for methat I need to start
planning,because 2026 will come around in no time.
(37:14):
Absolutely.
And I'll be here to help youevery step of the way,
wherever I can.
Thank Sukh. Well, thanks so much to all ofyou, Martin, Victoria and of course Sukh.
This was so much fun.
Thank you very much, everyone.
Thank you.
Thank you for having us.Thank you so much.
For more information about How Dejerois bringing resilient connectivity
to broadcasters around the world,or to book a demo
(37:36):
and learn more about our newproducts, head to dejero.com.
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