Clearcast

We’re best known for clearing ads. In the UK, broadcasters aren’t allowed to show ads that are misleading, harmful or offensive. So before ads are shown, we check them against the UK Code of Broadcast Advertising (the BCAP Code), which sets out what is and isn’t permitted. Our copy clearance team considers around 28,400 scripts and views over 57,800 commercials every year.

We’re proud to play an important role in the world of advertising and we do more than just clear ads. Our other services provide support to agencies, advertisers and broadcasters across the industry.

The services that we provide are based on our core strengths:

• Compliance. We have over 50 years expertise in ensuring that television advertising complies with the BCAP code.
• Advertising processes. We’re uniquely positioned to streamline the process of getting ads to air to benefit everyone that advertises on TV and wider audio-visual media.
• Metadata. We hold a range of metadata related to commercials ranging from artists and music featured to advertising restrictions.

We’re developing rapidly and happy to discuss potential business partnerships that match our areas of expertise.

If you want to read more about us and what we do, visit our website.

Compliance of other Audio Visual Media Services, e.g. VOD

In 2009 we launched a compliance service for VoD advertising to help our clients comply with the Audio Visual Media Services Regulation. VoD ads are considered against the CAP (non-broadcast) code, if unique to VoD. Ads that cleared for linear TV will automatically be considered for compliance for VoD.

Attribution

Our Attribution service underpins the analysis of television advertising in the UK. We’re responsible for validating data for all BARB reported commercial copy transmitted on UK television and attributing it to a product, advertiser, advertising holding company, and buying agency. This facilitates a range of activities from media auditing to lead generation to share of voice analysis.

For any further queries regarding Attribution please contact help@clearcast.co.uk.

Music Reporting

Clearcast is responsible for reporting the usage of music in commercials to rights societies.

Cambridge Research Systems Ltd

Cambridge Research Systems was formed in 1986 as a partnership between Tom Robson, an electronics engineer, and his father, John Robson, a distinguished Vision Scientist at Cambridge University.

Their idea was to improve the way vision science experiments were performed, by using emerging personal computer technology to display dynamic images on cathode ray tube displays.

From these roots, Cambridge Research Systems has grown into the leading supplier of tools for vision science and we now offer a wide range of visual stimulus generators, eye trackers, stereo, 3D, contrast and colour tests and other specialist scientific products through our website at www.crsltd.com.

In 2000, Cambridge Research Systems was approached by Professor Graham Harding, an expert in photosensitive epilepsy who had been acting as a consultant to the television industry for many years. As Head of Vision Sciences at Aston University, Professor Harding was a long-standing customer of Cambridge Research Systems, and knew that our expertise in creating tools for vision science would be invaluable in creating an automated system to check broadcast images for stimuli likely to provoke photosensitive epilepsy.

Through this collaboration, the Harding Flash and Pattern Analyser was developed. (See www.hardingfpa.tv for more details)

Since then, continued development and worldwide sales have seen the HardingFPA become ‘the’ standard for video analysis.