As many GMs and traffic managers will be looking to update their traffic and billing systems this year, RBR/TVBR asked a few current (and new) vendors to detail their latest and upcoming offerings. As well, what sets their systems apart from the rest. More tomorrow.

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LAN International

The Viero Revenue Management Solution provides a suite of high performance tools that provide critical visibility across the enterprise in real time, and far into the future. They give you fast and complete answers, and then help your organization shift direction on a dime. At last, you'll have the power to make virtually instantaneous course corrections that take fullest advantage of changing market conditions.

With Viero Traffic & Billing, you can produce more accurate revenue and avails reports with a granularity of data unparalleled in the marketplace.

Easy to use, customizable, and entirely scalable, this cornerstone of our product suite equips you with all the tools necessary to support the local, regional or enterprise environment.

MERS - Media Executive Reporting Solution

Relax knowing a secure Web-enabled, subscription based reporting system delivers mission critical inventory, revenue and financial information directly to your email inbox and is available on the website.

Reporting displays are role-based and the data can be defined to meet your specific enterprise reporting needs.

Rate and Yield Management

Create your rate structure based on the true supply and real demand, with the help of this powerful but easy-to-use web-based tool that maximizes the revenue-generating potential of your inventory. Navigate within a user-friendly dashboard and discover a range of different reporting functions. You'll review and analyze forecasts by month and quarter, set station demand curves and rate structure, and create rate cards that are sensitive to the needs of your market and your bottom line.

Booking Agent

Our dynamic scheduling engine matches hundreds of order attributes with available inventory to automatically place spots into the most advantageous positions for as far into the future as you desire. Demonstrating extreme booking performance, our forward scheduling Booking

Agent continuously evaluates spot placement and inventory demand.

This constant evaluation results in accurate and timely inventory and revenue reporting allowing you to evaluate your business, real time.

Electronic Order Entry, Order Management and Invoicing Capabilities

Create a paperless office, with in-the-field, web-based order generation, electronic routing and approval process, and automatic insertion of the approved order into the Viero traffic system. If you wish, streamlined import of proposals from Tapscan via TrafficLink is also available.

Provide your clients the data automation they require, while accelerating your billing cycle through the use of our robust electronic invoicing capabilities. Current EDI partners include SpotData and Katz Media, with a standard AAAA file format and delivery methods such as ftp and secure email.

It's our unparalleled support and consultative relationships with our clients that set us apart from the competition. Viero is more than just software-Viero is the revenue management solution developed for media professionals by media professionals.

SintecMedia

SintecMedia's OnAir provides end-to-end management of product placement and secondary commercials. Faced with increasingly diminishing audiences resulting from new channels and penetration of new technologies such as PVRs, broadcasters are looking for creative ways to increase brand awareness, enhance their image, and find new sources of revenue. The OnAir product line features have been designed so that product placements and secondary commercials are integrated with conventional forms of advertising, thus, enabling inclusion of these forms of advertising in a regular campaign.

In the OnAir system, secondary commercials refer to commercials that are superimposed on the main event such as "banners", bugs or logos, or displayed on one side of the screen while the main programming is displayed on the other (split screen). Product placements are treated in OnAir just like secondary events, but are not just simply sent to any automation machine. Whether the placement is visual, verbal, or hands-on, broadcasters must have a way to price, track, invoice, and report on these revenues as easily as dealing with a 30-second spot.

With OnAir, broadcasters can now easily manage secondary inventory, price it, embed secondary spots into orders, track the spots and the order, invoice, and report on all revenues.

Features:

• Allows the definition of secondary inventory including how many and what type can be placed in a specific show

• Combines proposals, contracts, and invoices with secondary elements such as product placement as integral components of conventional airtime sales

• Provides full support for brand and industry clash-checking against conventional commercials, and invoices all secondary elements along with conventional airtime

• Permits the ability to track each product placement element with an exact location of the brand mentioned and its duration.

• Enables associating product placements with banners and squeeze backs thus leveraging the effectiveness of the product placement by directing the audience to a call center or a web site.