UBS is the largest bank in Switzerland, and it specializes in providing financial
services, such as wealth management and investing services, to private, corporate,
and institutional clients. Moreover, UBS’s reach is global. It operates in over fifty
countries on five continents and employs 60,000 people around the world. The
bank’s Nashville offices support its Wealth Management and Investment
Management divisions and recently expanded into two floors and 30,000-square feet
of office space at One Franklin Park. UBS hired Nashville A/V integration firm
Southeastern Sound to install a sound masking system to protect the privacy of its
clients’ conversations. Although the original plan called for separate noise
generators, separate equalizers, and separate amplifiers, Southeastern Sound
value-engineered the system by unifying all of those functions with an Ashly Pema
8250.70 integrated 8×8 Protea™ matrix digital processor and 8-channel amplifier.

“The masking consultant’s original plan called for multiple signal processors, one for
each separate function,’ said Brian Cook, senior audio designer at Southeastern
Sound. “I looked at the spec and saw an effective way to value-engineer the system
with an Ashly Pema 8250.70. Everything they needed for masking was already
included in the Pema. We submitted the Ashly PEMA unit as a replace and the
consultant readily approve the change. The PEMA unit has a noise generator, plenty
of flexible EQ and filtering, and plenty of amplifier channels so that we could
process the different areas as separate zones. Some of the space is occupied by
cubicles and some is occupied by conference rooms, and the rest is occupied by
walled offices or common spaces. The Ashly Pema 8250.70 was less money and
less rack space than the comparable multi-piece system.’

The Ashly Pema 8250.70 covers two floors and its eight 250W amplifier channels
power over two hundred Atlas Sound M1000 masking loudspeakers. “The consultant
was very pleased with the flexibility and functionality of the Ashly processing,’ said
Cook. “He liked the ease of use, the application of the filters, and the precision of
the parameter adjustments. For example, when he needed a 2dB bump at 2kHz,
that’s precisely what he got. In all, it was a home run. The proof of that is in the
plan for another smaller area of masking that UBS wants to add. The consultant has
requested an Ashly Pema 4125.70 integrated processor and four-channel amp!’