Client
La Scala
On the Web
www.teatroallascala.org Project
Broadcast/Cable/Rich Media
Shortcut to
Business Challenge
How Accenture Helped
High Performance Delivered Download the full case study [PDF, 133K]
PDF Help Executive Summary
Accenture is building the digital infrastructure that will
allow La Scala personnel to categorize, search, retrieve and track usage of the
librettos, scores, programs, props and sets used throughout its history.
For more than 200 years, the legendary Italian opera house
La Scala has staged music, dance and opera performances to critical acclaim.
Today La Scala's rich cultural heritage lives on in artifacts dating back to
the theatre's earliest productions. Housed in warehouses around Milan are
60,000 costumes, 90,000 props, 4,000 backdrops, 5,000 musical scores—one
million objects in all—which serve as resources also for new productions. Given
the size of the collection, physically locating objects can prove daunting.
When a performance director needs a prop, for example, someone must search each
facility where it may be stored—a time-consuming, costly effort.
At
the same time, Italian laws under which cultural institutions such as La Scala
operate are changing. Where once government was the primary source of funding,
legislation now requires that opera houses obtain a portion of their funding
from the private sector. In the case of La Scala, the theatre must generate
half its own revenues within five years.
Business
Challenge With ticket sales relatively fixed, La Scala's revenue
growth is expected to come from showcasing, licensing and merchandising the
theatre's music and memorabilia over the Internet. But how will this be
accomplished? Working with Accenture, La Scala is leveraging the value of its
archives through creation of an integrated system for Digital Asset Management
(DAM), modeled on those used by today's most successful businesses. These
systems digitize and then organize content for fast, easy reference, access and
retrieval.
The experience Accenture gained in building other Digital
Asset Management solutions enabled the firm to identify the best archival
architecture and state-of-the-art technology support for La Scala. Together,
Accenture and La Scala then developed a master plan for a comprehensive system
for Digital Asset Management. Using these archives as the source for most of
the items La Scala wants to make available over the Web is key to the plan.
How Accenture Helped Accenture is building the digital infrastructure that will
allow La Scala personnel to categorize, search, retrieve and track usage of the
librettos, scores, programs, props and sets used throughout its history. Upon
completion, the system will provide access to the entire inventory of items
needed to stage performances, and provide an ideal platform for new eCommerce
revenue streams.
A careful analysis of the opera house's organizational
structure, the steps in the creative process, and the needs of different work
areas drove decisions about methodology. The project began with preserving the
musical archives and recording 5,000 hours of music onto CDs. The complex props
archive has also been done. The master plan includes set up and connection of
ten digital archives to complete the integrated system. Technologies used
include leading-edge offerings from Oracle such as Developer suite and
Developer 2000.
High Performance Delivered As La Scala enters its third century of operation, the
Digital Asset Management project is a central element of its mission to
modernize management, organize resources and enhance revenues from the private
sector. Leveraging artifacts from past performances will enable La Scala to
streamline daily theatre operations and reduce performance costs. In the near
future, it will also give museums and students worldwide online access to a
priceless heritage of cultural assets. While initial use of the database will
be largely internal, other cultural institutions, universities and Internet
users will soon have access to the theatre's archival collections, creating
valuable new revenue streams for the famous opera house.
In a recent interview, La Scala underscores the point, "La
Scala possesses a cultural archive of inestimable value. Before now, these rich
assets sat in warehouses when not on the stage. With the help of Accenture, La
Scala is now enhancing the efficiency of its own artistic operations, and will
in the future be able to make this world-class resource available to opera
lovers everywhere over the Internet."
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