User:Ricwest

Richard was born in Mamaroneck, NY, Richard started in television in 1969 in a middle school TV studio in Mamamroneck, NY, a suburb of New York City. Richard attended Brown Institute for Broadcasting, and University of Maryland, University College, while working fulltime at NBC.

In 1978 he began his career working as an Operations Technician at a small UHF station in Ft Lauderdale, FL called WKID-TV (now WSCV)[doing a little bit of everything. In 1981, he moved to the Nation’s Capital and began the first phase of his 25-year career with GE/NBC-Universal starting with a 17-year stint @ NBC News and the NBC Station’s Division in Washington, DC. He worked in every operational area from local news editing to Technical Director for the Today Show. In the early-mid 1990’s Richard received several awards and recognition for his production/Editing work, including a regional Emmy and a Silver and Gold medal from the NY Festivals.

In 1994, Richard was promoted to Manager of Engineering & Operation’s for NBC’s TV Station, WRC. In addition to overseeing the local news technical operation, he also worked closely with the MSTV HD model station project, as well as the first digital conversion within NBC’s TV Stations group at WRC. In 1998, NBC purchased KXAS-TV, Richard was promoted to Director of Engineering and moved to the Dallas/Ft Worth Metroplex. On November 1, 1998, KXAS-DT officially began regular digital broadcasts on channel 41.

In January 2001, Richard was chosen to work on a team to develop a centralized broadcast and distribution model for the NBC TV stations. The Project linked the NBC TV stations, via 3 regional control centers (HUBs). The project took 18 months from start to finish and is currently operational at 13 NBC Stations. In 2002 Richard lead the engineering and facilities build out of the NBC ArtHouse project in Fort Worth, Texas.

By 2002 Richard was asked to move to NY where he held the position of VP, Digital Media Production in the NBC Technical Operations and Production Systems group “TOPS” and worked on several strategic projects for NBC-Universal. Soon after, he worked closly with a team of NY engieers to bring on-line a unique tapeless editing and graphics environment for NBC News.

In March 2005, Richard rejoined the TV Stations team and moved to LA to become the VP, Enigneering, broadcast Operations and IT for NBC & Telemundo's three owned TV stations.