CCI Space Shuttle Coverage wins Emmy

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fl., May 17, 1999 --- Communications Concepts, Inc. (CCI), an audio visual communications company, with headquarters in Cape Canaveral was part of the team that was honored with an Emmy Award at the 35th Annual Midwestern Regional Emmy Awards.

The Award was given to recognize the outstanding team effort involved in covering an event that does not happen everyday and effects a large segment of the community. The Emmy was given to CCI’s client, WBNS – Ohio News Network, for coverage of STS-95 John Glenn Launch at an awards gala at The Museum Center at Cincinnati's Union Terminal. In his award acceptance speech, David Sirak, News Operations Manager for WBNS, thanked the entire team of over 170 talented people for their contributions and specifically thanked the crew of Communications Concepts “without them this wouldn’t have happened.”

Communications Concepts produced live coverage of the Glenn Launch for WBNS providing crews, staging, set, a multi-camera production truck, microwave truck and satellite uplink truck. Coverage from Kennedy Space Center started weeks before the launch with Space Shuttle Rollout and Astronaut arrival. Launch week coverage included live reports for morning, mid-day, prime and late newscasts. To accomplish this, CCI provided two sixteen-person crews that allowed WBNS to shoot and edit from 4:00 AM until 1:00 AM daily. KSC coverage by CCI included not only reports from the Shuttle Press Site, but also from Astronauts Hall of Fame – Space Camp. Coverage by CCI concluded with the Space Shuttle landing at KSC. This was the second time CCI Shuttle Launch coverage had been nominated for an Emmy. CCI had been previously nominated for its work for Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

The award was one of 79 Emmys presented out of the 671 entries received from the thirteen television markets and four states that make up the midwestern region. The Emmys are presented to recognize outstanding achievement by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. The Academy was formed in 1955 when legendary television personality Ed Sullivan convened a meeting of fifty of the most prominent television industry leaders -- all concerned about the future of the television medium, which had only recently captured the imagination and loyalty of the American public. With leaders such as Walter Cronkite, Fred Allen, Charles Collingwood, Edward R. Murrow, Carl Reiner, Neil Simon, Mark Goodson and Basil Rathbone among them, the organization doubled within two weeks to become the "Committee of 100." This high level group was committed to the establishment of a National Television Academy. Since those early heady days, NATAS has been a story of extraordinary growth in numbers of members and chapters, plus the phenomenal scope and breadth of programs and services. Membership has flourished to more than 11,000, making NATAS the single largest television professional association in the world. NATAS is represented by 17 chapters nationwide serving 97 percent of the viewing public.

Communications Concepts, Inc. is one of the few productions companies to offer all services in-house. Its list of clients include: broadcasters such as WBNS, NBC, ABC and CBC; cable networks such as CNN and Sunshine; Fortune 500 firms such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Harris Corporation and government agencies such as the EPA, the U.S. Navy; as well as the international governments of Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, and Mexico.