[opendtv] US broadcasters plan national mobile content network
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 15 Apr 2010 09:55:52 -0500
"There were more positive items on the agenda though, including a joint venture
by a dozen broadcasters to create a national mobile content and television
service."
Finally. The question being, why did it take M/H to get this sort of initiative
going?
Bert
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http://www.rethink-wireless.com/article.asp?article_id=2892&pg=1
US broadcasters plan national mobile content network
Will deliver video and other media to handsets, keeping spectrum away from FCC
By CAROLINE GABRIEL
Published: 15 April, 2010
The year's largest gathering of US broadcasters, the NAB conference, is
particularly high profile this week because of the dispute with the FCC over
repurposing some TV spectrum for wireless broadband. There were more positive
items on the agenda though, including a joint venture by a dozen broadcasters
to create a national mobile content and television service.
This is a clear tactic to justify keeping the spectrum under the control of the
broadcasters and their content partners, in return for delivering new and
innovative services - ones that the sector argues would be less attractive in
the hands of the cellcos, which also have advanced mobile content agendas. The
biggest names behind the venture are NBC, Fox and Cox Media Group, plus Belo,
EW Scripps, Gannett Broadcasting, Hearst Television., ION Television, Media
General, Meredith, Post-Newsweek Stations and Raycom Media.
These partners plan to aggregate their spectrum to offer live and on-demand
video, news, sports and entertainment as well as books and magazines, via
cellphones, tablets, notebooks, media players and in-car systems. This is
another step in the publishing industry's ongoing war against free web content
and the ad-supported Google model, which has seen giants like Hearst and
Murdoch embracing new devices like e-readers, and specialized networks, in a
bid to deliver a superior experience - one users would be prepared to pay for.
The planned new service would be based on the ATSC-M/H mobile TV standard. The
partners will form a management team to secure more content, spectrum and
distribution partners. Details will be made available at a later date.
The FCC's National Broadband Initiative proposals want to take 40% of the
broadcasters' spectrum back for wireless services, compensating them with a
share of auction proceeds. The new group argues that its plans will support the
FCC's aim of reducing wireless congestion and promoting new services, by
handling the most bandwidth intensive apps such as video content. Of course,
this would also reduce the power of the major carriers, which see such content
services as one of their primary sources of new ARPU in future.
National broadcasters have taken the lead in other countries, such as Japan and
Korea, and the current US partnership was originally mooted last year with the
formation of the 'Pearl Project'.
In its recent report, 'The Rise of the ATSC M/H Machines', Rethink Technology's
Faultline digital media service predicted that this network could take until
the end of 2011 to be built, making 2012 the year of mobile TV in the US. The
risk is that, in that period, broadcast mobile TV could be overtaken by over
the top content, over Wi-Fi and 3G. But Japan had extremely advanced streaming
video services before its ISDB-T broadcast offerings were launched and yet
these services now extend to 85% of Japanese handsets, so perhaps the obsession
with streamed video was needed to make the operators truly embrace mobile
video. Now the new grouping will beat the 2012 timeframe by more than a year
and complete the installation of ATSC M/H digital exciters by the end of 2009.
A trial will begin next month in Washington DC and national launch will begin
around year end.
Gradually, more suppliers are putting ATSC M/H into their platforms - last week
Ericsson launched an ATSC M/H ecosystem using encoders from Envivio and M/H
multiplexing from Axcera. The sector needs a second merchant chip around which
to build devices - currently these are all supplied by LG, which is also
driving devices itself. Samsung has a chip for its own devices only, but could
make this more widely available, while a specialist mobile TV silicon supplier,
such as Siano Mobile Silicon, which dominates the Chinese standard, or
MaxLinear, prominent in Japan, could also enter the US space.
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