“NBC had the foresight to recognize the importance of the paperless workflow, and pushed their local stations to get onboard as well,” says Kevin Gallagher, senior vice president/local investment director at GM Planworks and formerly the chair of the 4As’ EDI Committee. “Today it’s not an option to go any other way but electronic,” he states.

At the end of 2005, GM Planworks sent a dictate to the industry requiring its vendors to conduct all business electronically or to start developing the capability to do so. “With the fracturing of the marketplace, there are more and more spots to manage. Doing true EDI is an absolute necessity for managing the volume of orders we place,” says Kathy McCauley, senior vice president/managing director at GM Planworks.

NBC had the foresight to recognize the importance of the paperless workflow, and pushed their local stations to get onboard as well.

Kevin Gallagher, senior vice president/local investment director, GM Planworks

NBC was the only vendor able to fully comply with GM Planworks’ request for all-electronic orders. “We were ahead of the game since we were already on the DDS MediaOcean system, which adeptly processed the tremendous volume of GM Planworks’ business, completely electronically,” says Rich Cerussi, executive vice president of sales, NBC Universal Television Stations. "We’re pleased that we could meet our customer's needs while also streamlining the way we do business," he adds.


The DARE transaction protocol together with the MediaOcean system achieves the only seamless, two-way dialog between media buying and media sales systems. Electronic orders and offers flow seamlessly between systems and automatically update the databases on both sides. It benefits all trading partners by eliminating discrepancies and saving time on tedious, labor-intensive tasks such as manually re-keying faxed orders and revisions. In addition, the MediaOcean system integrates with the station’s traffic system, guaranteeing that actual spots are booked in the traffic system.

“We are very proud to be working with NBC to help them achieve a new level of integration within their station and with agency partners,” says Harvey Kent, managing director of DDS MediaOcean. “NBC processed all GM Planworks’ business electronically for local as well as national television. GM Planworks is committed to conducting business as seamlessly and as error-free as possible with all vendors. We are thrilled to be joining them in bringing eBusiness advantages to our industry,” states Kent.