Behind the scenes at Barbie’s favourite corporate TV station

There has been a lot of buzz lately about a Barbie movie inspired by the much-loved fashion doll from toy manufacturer Mattel. Sales of Barbie are booming on the back of the movie’s success.

But, in the real world, there is an even more interesting story that can be told for anyone who has to produce corporate video at scale.

This is the story of the voice communication solutions deployed by Mattel’s sophisticated video production unit.

The stars of this production are Barbie’s friend Jose Robles, who works as Mattel’s senior AV technician and audio engineer, and other cast members in Mattel’s AV team. And the principal supporting actors are Clear-Com’s Arcadia IP platform, FreeSpeak II wireless intercoms, Agent-IC mobile app and LQ Series IP interfaces.

Details of the plot can be found in a case study by Clear-Com but first let’s set the scene.

There is more to Mattel than iconic Barbie dolls. The company’s brands include Hot Wheels, Fisher Price, American Girl, Thomas & Friends, UNO, Masters of the Universe, Monster High and MEGA.

And Mattel doesn’t just produce toys. It has a hand in film and TV content, gaming and digital experiences, music and live events. The company operates in more than 35 locations and its products are sold in more than 150 countries.

What kind of video production team is needed for a company with this breadth of brands and content? It is one that needs a fail-proof, network-friendly communications system to tie six studios and a main corporate tower together.

This video team has to create customer presentations and corporate productions. Think webinars and toy demos, sales presentations and investor pitches. We are talking about live event presentations with broadcast-quality content, with contributors and viewers across the globe.

So how does the team use Clear-Com’s solutions? Well it appears that the technology provided by the Arcadia Central Station System and FreeSpeak II solutions is particularly important.

“It’s perfect for our corporate AV over IP environment that requires a large deployment of wireless users across multiple locations,” says Mattel’s Robles. “We often must expand our communications to multiple venues and integrate outside participants or remote members of our production team. By using our existing IP network, we can quickly and reliably expand our intercom system.”

Using Arcadia Central Station means Robles and his AV team can manage all communications from a single location. There is no need for matrixed intercom systems at different ends of network connections. Using Clear-Com’s configuration software, the AV team can quickly set up users or troubleshoot without sending an on-site team to one of the production studios. And it is easy to expand the system by adding more transceivers and beltpacks.

Arcadia Central Station is tied into network switches, uses Clear-Com’s LQ Series of IP connectivity interfaces and supports third-party Dante devices, together creating a smart IP communications solution across the entire Mattel comms infrastructure.

“We also added fibre throughout our buildings, which combined with our Arcadia IP intercom system has been a game-changer,” adds Robles. “This is helping us futureproof our infrastructure against increased video bandwidth, allowing us to transmit more data, audio, and video. I can simply patch any channel with another building now through fibre. Plus, we can transmit our content and communicate effectively during our productions over longer distances than ever before, and without signal interference. It’s ideal for our campus-wide AV systems, conferences, and presentations.”

As with many organisations, Mattel has adopted a hybrid work model, and Clear-Com’s IP capabilities help provide remote access and comms for the technical team and customers to take part in productions regardless of location. Corporate productions and customer presentations even continued when many companies ceased operations during the pandemic.

The Agent-IC mobile app connects to Mattel’s network, allowing remote production team members access to its intercom channels.

“It’s been like communications glue for our team, and we were able to maintain our usual workflow seamlessly. Agent-IC is a vital part of the success of our productions as it provides an intercom panel on a mobile device, giving our remote team the communications connectivity they need. I really love the combination of Clear-Com technology – the wired and wireless options plus Agent-IC. It’s really helped remove a lot of the unnecessary back-and-forth emails that can waste time and energy for our production team as conversations are now in real-time. From a technical standpoint, I can fine-tune the intercom channels, adjust the gain to improve the sound for comms users, and troubleshoot with audio engineers in another building, all from my central control room,” says Robles. “Clear-Com Arcadia, FreeSpeak II, and Agent-IC have really supported us, taking our video productions to the next level.”

Kit list

Want to find out more about the Clear-Com solutions in use at Mattel? See the details below:

• The Arcadia Central Station System scalable IP intercom platform
• FreeSpeak II wireless intercom systems
• The Agent IC mobile app
• LQ Series IP interfaces