Eurotek complete install of Irelands first corporate TV channel

Ireland's newest TV channel . . . coming to a CityJet base near you

'The staff reaction has been mixed but it's definitely leaning towards the postive so far," says CityJet's media producer Gwen Robinson. ,

SOME companies think an internal magazine makes them the bees knees in the inhouse communications stakes.

But now Irish airline CityJet has gone one better with plans to launch its own company-wide TV station.

From October the new station, dubbed Voracity, will be CityJet's key tool for keeping in touch with its 700 staff across its bases in London, Paris and Dublin.

Voracity's offering will include everthing from staff birthdays to corporate news and coverage of CityJet's sporting adventures, with the results shown on big screens at CityJet's bases as well as through the airline's internet portal.

The project represents a radical departure from traditional corporate communications and its ambition trumps anything attempted by Ireland's two largest airlines (though Ryanair's internal magazine is still the forerunner in the hilarity stakes, by a considerable margin).

Such radicalism, however, is "definitely expensive", admits CityJet media producer Gwen Robinson, who is heading up the TV venture.

So if a corporate magazine is good enough for nigh every other company in Ireland, what makes CityJet so special that it needs its own TV station? "Well it was Geoff's idea really," says Robinson, referring to CityJet's chief executive Geoffrey Byrne White.

"The idea was that we have four different bases that are completely disconnected because they're in different countries, so this will link them all together. We do have the usual stuff like magazines and bulletins but they're static and people who fly don't have access every day to their email. Whereas this will be on the big screen so everybody can see it."

Robinson's plans include creating 30 to 40 minute TV shows, which will loop every five or six days.

As for the logistics of the projects, Robinson makes Voracity sound like a reasonably manageable prospect. The content will be filmed on digital cameras and packaged using Digital Signage, a system currently used by many convenience stores for advertising.