Bridge Technologies To Expand VB440 Deployment Options

Bridge Technologies is set to use IBC 2026 to announce a significant expansion of deployment options for its VB440 production probe, with the company making the platform available as a software-based solution for the first time.

The announcement will be made at Booth 1.A71, where visitors will also be able to see the software-based VB440 operating across multiple platforms.

The VB440 has traditionally been delivered as a pre-installed 1RU appliance, providing broadcasters with a plug-and-play monitoring and production platform for camera operators, audio engineers and network specialists. The dedicated hardware format was designed to provide a reliable, high-density solution while reducing the complexity associated with server configuration, particularly in production environments where space is limited.

Bridge Technologies is now separating the VB440's software capabilities from its traditional hardware platform. The software can be purchased as a complete unit for on-premises deployment on existing hardware, or accessed on a function-by-function basis through third-party services including NEP Platform and Grass Valley's AMPP.

The move is designed to give broadcasters greater flexibility in how they deploy the VB440's production and monitoring functions, with the software able to take advantage of both cloud and on-premises processing, as well as owned or rented compute resources.

The software-based offering is particularly aimed at large-scale live productions and major sporting events, where production requirements can change rapidly. Rather than deploying dedicated hardware for each monitoring requirement, engineering teams can create additional VB440 instances when needed, using the capacity of larger server architectures before scaling back once an event has finished.

According to Bridge Technologies, this approach extends the VB440's production tools to a virtually unlimited number of users by allowing multiple processing engines to be deployed in parallel.

The move also forms part of Bridge Technologies' wider strategy of providing flexibility in how its software is deployed. The same VB440 software can run on a dedicated appliance in an outside broadcast truck, on servers in a data centre or in cloud environments through orchestration platforms.

The company says the different deployment models retain the VB440's analysis capabilities, customisable Canvas interface and multi-user functionality, allowing broadcasters to adapt the platform to different operational requirements.

Commenting on the announcement, Bridge Technologies Chairman Simen Frostad said: "The VB440 has always been about the software. The appliance was a great way to deliver it - simple, reliable, and incredibly capable in a compact form factor. But the underlying capabilities have always had the potential to scale further, and now there are convenient ways to access that scalability through platforms like NEP and Grass Valley. For broadcasters covering events of any size, this means they can deploy the VB440's tools exactly when and where they need them, without being constrained by hardware".

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