Editing Independent Broadcasting Authority (section)

==Engineering advances==
[[File:EBU Colorbars.svg|thumb|Rendition of [[European Broadcasting Union|EBU]]/IBA 100/0/75/0 [[EBU colour bars|Colour Bars pattern]], later standardised as [[ITU-R]] BT.471-1.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.channel6.dk/mainsite/EN/Page421.html |title=Channel 6 Television Denmark – Test patterns (English) |website=Channel6.dk |date=14 December 2016 |accessdate=2022-02-17}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.channel6.dk/mainsite/Downloads/Test%20patterns%20HD/EBU%20BAR%20HD.jpg |format=JPG|title=Photographic image of colour bars|website=Channel6.dk|access-date=2022-02-23}}</ref><ref name="BT.471">{{cite web|url=https://www.itu.int/dms_pubrec/itu-r/rec/bt/R-REC-BT.471-1-198607-I!!PDF-E.pdf |title=RECOMMENDATION ITU-R BT.471-1* – Nomenclature and description of colour bar signals |website=Itu.int |date= |accessdate=2022-02-17}}</ref>]] 
The Experimental and Development Department, as part of the IBA's Engineering Division, was responsible for much leading-edge research into broadcasting technology as well as being responsible for the design and manufacture of specialist equipment that could not be procured from commercial manufacturers. In particular, the IBA's E&D Department developed SABRE (Steerable Adaptable Broadcast Receiving Equipment) that enabled mainland broadcast television channels to be received for re-broadcasting in the [[Channel Islands]]. During the early 1980s, the E&D Department designed and manufactured the specialised broadcast receiving and monitoring equipment used to build the national broadcast network for [[Channel Four]]. Subsequently, E&D's engineers proposed a system of analogue television encoding known as [[Multiplexed Analogue Components|MAC]] (Multiplexed Analogue Component) to provide a standard for the forthcoming satellite television broadcasts that was more robust than an extension of the existing PAL system used for terrestrial broadcasts. E&D's engineers also designed and built some of the first digital audio equipment for satellite broadcasting including systems using data packets. E&D's engineers made many important contributions to digital television data-rate reduction whereby the encoding of a standard analogue [[PAL]] colour signal requiring some 130 Megabits/second has been reduced to less than 4 Megabits/second as used on current [[Digital terrestrial television|digital television broadcasting]].