Corporate communicators on the cutting edge.

• Author: Gross, Howard

Companies are exploiting the latest innovations in computers, satellites, and small format video to provide news and information to worldwide audiences.

IN THE AGE of information, television is the national grapevine. During the past two decades, the medium has reshaped the dynamics of politics, religion, journalism, and sports. Now, it is business, turn.

As companies deal with larger, more distant, and more diverse markets, video is replacing print as the communication mode of choice. Since 1973, the corporate television industry has doubled in size approximately every two years, and--despite cutbacks, layoffs, and downsizing--continues to grow at a rate of about 17.5% annually. Currently, better than 750,000 firms regularly employ video services and personnel. In 1991, these organizations spent $8,000,000,000 turning out up to 10 times more programming than all broadcast and cable TV companies combined.

Yet, the numbers of dollars and programs notwithstanding, corporate television remains relatively obscure. One reason is that its presentations are not public events. They represent private interests, sometimes shrouded in secrecy. Companies use video to preview products and services, train workers, and present news--good and bad --to employees and shareholders.

Even those programs open to public scrutiny may leave audiences less than enthralled. It is not that corporate television can't be entertaining. Much of it is. However, the overriding message is always about business.

It is a precept that dates back to the turn of the century, when businesses relied on silent movies to help peddle their wares. By World War II, film had become a popular business medium that prevailed throughout the 1950s and early 1960s. Then, a new act burst onto the scene--multi-image. Gravity-feed slide projectors and fast-sequencing carousels upstaged antiquated film strips and flip charts, while enhancements such as dissolve units, multi-image programmers, and multi-channel audio transformed ordinary slide shows into sight-and-sound extravaganzas. By 1973, corporations were producing more than 200,000,000 slides annually.

That was also the year Sony introduced the U-Matic, the first three-quarter-inch videocassette. Orginally designed for the home market, the color player/recorder fared poorly because it was expensive and hard to handle. The consumer's loss was industry's gain.

Corporations quickly adapted to the advantages of television. Programs produced on video could be duplicated and distributed more cost-effectively than film or slides could. The advent of smaller, portable cameras and editing systems also meant that...