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News & Headlines

SBE Members Chernock and Laird to Receive NAB Engineering Awards at 2016 NAB Show

March 23, 2016

Richard Chernock, chief science officer at Triveni Digital, and Andrew Laird, CPBE, former vice president and chief technology officer at Journal Broadcast Group, have been named the 2016 recipients of the NAB Engineering Achievement Awards. They will be honored at the NAB Technology Luncheon on April 20 in Las Vegas. Additionally, the Digital Leadership Award will be presented to Adam Symson, senior vice president and chief digital officer at The E.W. Scripps Company.

Established in 1959, the Engineering Achievement Awards are given to individuals who are nominated by their peers for significant contributions to advancing the state of the art in broadcast engineering. In 2015, the Digital Leadership Award was established to honor an individual at a broadcast station, group or network who has had a significant role in transforming a traditional broadcast business to succeed on digital media platforms.

The 2016 NAB Television Engineering Achievement Award
Richard Chernock is the chief science officer for Triveni Digital, where he has been employed since 2002, following a 20-plus year career with IBM. Chernock has been heavily involved with industry activities regarding digital television broadcasting and currently serves as chairman of the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) Technology Group on ATSC 3.0. The group is overseeing the creation of the next-generation broadcast transmission standard. He is also a prolific evangelist and educator on ATSC 3.0, publishing papers and making presentations at many conferences and tradeshows worldwide. Chernock previously served as chairman of the ATSC Technology Group that oversaw the development of enhancements to the DTV standard, including the ATSC Mobile and ATSC 2.0 suite of standards, the recommended practice on audio loudness and numerous others.

The 2016 NAB Radio Engineering Achievement Award
Andrew Laird, CPBE, recently retired as vice president and chief technology officer for Journal Broadcast Group. Laird began his career in the 1960s developing audio processors and designing and building radio facilities. He worked in the 1970s and 1980s as a studio design consultant and chief engineer for a variety of customers and radio groups. Throughout his career, Laird participated in important industry activities and played a crucial role in the evaluation and standardization of the system for digital AM and FM radio broadcasting in the U.S. through his work with the NAB co-sponsored National Radio Systems Committee (NRSC), where he most recently served as the co-chair of the Digital Radio Broadcasting (DRB) subcommittee.