SVG Sit-Down: GV President Tim Shoulders Says the Move to the Cloud Will Transform Creativity A physical move consolidates the company's manufacturing ops in Montreal By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director
Friday, February 26, 2021 - 1:23 pm
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlights
Grass Valley President Tim Shoulders stepped into his new role in 2018, and, in the three years since, the company has undergone a tremendous transformation. Last July, it made the transition from public company to a private company after Black Dragon Capital acquired it from Belden. At just about the same time, the company made a move to cloud-first production tools via GV AMPP.
And now it is taking another transformative step: selling its original Grass Valley, CA, facility and moving the team there into leased office space.
All those moves are designed to help the company better serve customers, drive efficiencies, and chart a course for the future. Shoulders discussed those issues and more with SVG Co-Executive Director Ken Kerschbaumer.
Grass Valley's Tim Shoulders: We have had to make some bold changes to adapt to selling more virtualized solutions and accessing the power of elastic compute with cloud platforms.
This week, you announced a $5 million deal with Gravity Media. Can you give a little more context to that deal and what it means?
Sure. We have been evolving in a lot of different ways, but one of those ways is our commercial approach. We have a broad portfolio of products, and we can leverage that in a lot of ways to put together good commercial models for customers that help them get more technology with less investment.
And also, we're now privately held and less focused on the current quarter vs. the long-term transformation of the business. We have been working with customers to develop what we call enterprise agreements or long-term technology partnerships that give us some confidence in the volumes we're going to sell into those customers. And it gives the customer access to our technology, economic benefits, of course, and certainly service and support benefits.
[The deal with Gravity Media] is the first agreement we've announced. But there are certainly more to come.
In the past year, more and more productions have moved toward virtualized systems, and that means it is less about selling gear and calling back after it is amortized. Will that change the nature of your relationships with customers?
Yes, and it's the technologies that are the enabler, and the pressure is economics. Pre-COVID, the live-sports space has been one of the least impacted by economic pressures as the rights fees are high and the revenue is high. So the technology spend in that area has been one of the least scrutinized compared to, say, our customers that participate in news and entertainment.
One of the things I wanted to discuss was the decision to put the Grass Valley facility in Grass Valley on the market. Can you explain that?
We have had to make some bold changes as a company to be able to adapt to selling more virtualized solutions and, in particular, accessing the power of elastic compute with cloud platforms. Our business operational model needs to shift, and one [approach] was to consolidate manufacturing into our Montreal facility.
The trend for hardware products has been on the decline while the trend for software projects has been on the increase for the last few years. We reached an inflection point between those two and are consolidating our production in our state-of-the-art Montreal manufacturing facility.
That was one of the elements. The other element was just a rationalization of real estate around the world. Over time, we have combined several different independent companies, and we've collected our share of lease agreements and real estate.
Grass Valley's production switcher R&D and support will remain in Grass Valley, CA, but will move to leased space.
If you were designing Grass Valley from the bottom up, you wouldn't design it with the same real estate footprint that we have today. Our ethos is to keep employees that need to be in front of the customer as close to the customer as possible, and that includes not just commercial employees but also service and support employees that need to be at the customer to do integration or otherwise service an account.
We are making an effort to consolidate all the other functions into fewer facilities, so part of that rationalization of real estate is our Grass Valley, CA, facility, where we have had about 80 people the last several years. The major changes in that location have occurred in the past, but we've announced we're going to shrink our workforce in Grass Valley substantially and move out of the building we're in. What will be left in Grass Valley is basically research and development and support for the switchers line, so we will put the building on the market and then lease a small space for the switcher personnel to work.
Are people relocating to Montreal?
We will have jobs relocate, and we're putting hardware jobs into Montreal so that they can be closer to where the hardware is manufactured. The synergy of having those folks in the manufacturing facilities is pretty powerful.
We're consolidating our workforce into centers of excellence. We've got a location in each region, and we're going to be focusing our efforts around expanding those locations. Montreal is one of them for North America. In Europe, we're going to build out a new location in Poland, and we're expanding our facility in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
We will also use this opportunity to hire folks who are able to fit into our cloud ambitions in these new locations and capitalize on the growth we've seen in our cloud platform.
Our objective is to have the same number
Most recent headlines
05/01/2027
Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...
04/08/2026
Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...
04/07/2026
April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...
04/06/2026
Sony Electronics is introducing the SRG-AS10, a 4K 60p-compatible PTZ auto-frami...
04/06/2026
This recent grad from Spring, TX, led creative-video output for the Aggies' men's basketball team last season and has been producing video and creating ...
04/06/2026
For the first time at a women's golf major, every player in the field will r...
04/06/2026
Three Panasonic PT-RQ45 40,000-lumen 3-Chip DLP projectors made their first live...
04/06/2026
Bitmovin and Akamai have announced a collaboration with NRJ Group, a French mult...
04/06/2026
Telestream will exhibit at InfoComm 2026 (Booth N7952), demonstrating media work...
04/06/2026
Sony has announced the development of RIALTO 65, a 65mm format image sensor block for the VENICE 2 digital cinema camera, targeting release in the first half of...
04/06/2026
KOKUSAI DENKI Electric America will exhibit at InfoComm 2026 (Booth N8025, June ...
04/06/2026
Bell Media's TSN and RDS are the exclusive Canadian broadcasters of FIFA Wor...
04/06/2026
The Challenge: Receiving Heavy Media Files From Road Games Quickly and ReliablyT...
04/06/2026
MASV, a managed file transfer platform used in broadcast and live sports product...
04/06/2026
NESN has announced the appointment of Fahad Haider as Vice President of Operations and Engineering. Haider returns to NESN, where he previously served as Vice P...
04/06/2026
David J. Halberstam, who spent almost 50 years in sports as a broadcaster and an executive, died June 2 after a years-long battle with brain cancer.
Over his l...
04/06/2026
Although collegiate production programs are tasked with delivering high-quality ...
04/06/2026
California studio, two production trucks, global distribution system are combine...
04/06/2026
New global program empowers and supports storytellers through scriptwriting course and access to industry experts
TikTok and Sundance Institute today announce...
04/06/2026
Steinberg DAWs now boast in-depth Tonalic integration
Celemony's innovative virtual session musician plug-in has just received an update that brings ARA...
04/06/2026
Get Hands-On With Over 20 Mic Brands
GearExpo UK is fast approaching, and if you've been looking for a chance to check out some new mics, then you'r...
04/06/2026
Combos feature new Amplifier Intelligence engine
Positive Grid's latest release sees the company introduce two new combo amplifiers that promise to offe...
04/06/2026
Is Your Job Making You Work this June?
4 June, 2026
Media releases
SBS Launches the World Cup Watchers' Rights Association to Stand Up For Australians&...
04/06/2026
Statement regarding unauthorised use of SBS logos on third party social content
4 June, 2026
Media releases
SBS has become aware of social media posts in c...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Bitmovin, a leading provider of video streaming infrastructure, and Akamai, the cybersecurity and cloud computing company that powers and protects business onli...
04/06/2026
American Underground (AU), the Startup Hub of the South and a community of mor...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
Share
Copy link
Facebook
X
Linkedin
Bluesky
Email...
04/06/2026
NVIDIA and Microsoft Reinvent Windows PCs for the Age of Personal AI
Brie Clayton June 3, 2026
0 Comments
RTX Spark - a 1-Petaflop Superchip, the Full...
04/06/2026
Inside the Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man Grade
Brie Clayton June 3, 2026
0 Comments
Simone Grattarola discusses shaping the look in DaVinci Resolve...
04/06/2026
Cine Gear Expo Announces 2026 Awards of Excellence Recipients
Brie Clayton June 3, 2026
0 Comments
Ed Lachman ASC, Caleb Deschanel ASC, and M. David M...
04/06/2026
St. Vincents Live with Orchestra Tour to Feature Berklee Alum Ruby Plume Berklee alumni St. Vincent and Ruby Plume will appear on the same bill across seven d...
04/06/2026
Back to All News
All the Truth in My Lies Coming to Netflix on August 28
Entertainment
04 June 2026
GlobalSpain
Link copied to clipboard
Download the imag...
04/06/2026
Back to All News
Larry Tanz, VP of Content, EMEA, Delivers a Keynote Speech at ...
04/06/2026
Back to All News
Turn Your Living Room into a Stadium With the New FIFA World ...
04/06/2026
Keeping conversations real on LinkedIn Published on Jun 4, 2026 Categories: Product News
LinkedIn Corporate Communications
Share
LinkedIn
Facebook ...
04/06/2026
BackStory follows four Irish young people as they travel back to their parents' homelands
Modern Irish identity is enriched by cultures and influences from...
04/06/2026
June's forecast with GeForce NOW: 100% chance of gaming.
GeForce NOW is lining up new adventures for the month, from big-name blockbusters to quirky indies...
03/06/2026
SES and Viva, Mexico's ultra low-cost airline, have launched multi-orbit satellite inflight connectivity on Viva's Airbus aircraft. A total of 60 A320s ...
03/06/2026
The College Football Playoff, ESPN, and TNT Sports have announced kick times and...
03/06/2026
RED Digital Cinema will exhibit at Cine Gear Expo 2026 (Booth 33, June 5-6, Universal Studios Lot), hosting three panels and hands-on product demonstrations.
P...
03/06/2026
Roku has announced the Soccer Zone, a dedicated hub for FIFA World Cup 2026 content available across the United States, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, Argent...
SVG Sit-Down: GV President Tim Shoulders Says the Move to the Cloud Will Transform Creativity A physical move consolidates the company's manufacturing ops in Montreal By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director 
