Broadcasters More Keen On Deploying Mobile DTV Than Selling Spectrum, OMVC Says

Broadcasters are becoming more interested in mobile DTV opportunities and seem keen to use their spectrum to offer new services, rather than sell it in a voluntary auction like the one proposed in the FCC National Broadband Plan, said Open Mobile Video Coalition President Brandon Burgess. “We have gotten some surprisingly amazing support from our members encouraging us to do what we're doing,” Burgess, also Ion Media CEO, said Thursday. “We have members joining us in real-time.”

Univision and Entravision recently joined the coalition, which is pushing for widespread mobile DTV deployment, Burgess said. “If people have alternate plans for spectrum, we're certainly not seeing it.” Ion Media’s ownership, largely made up of lenders since the company’s bankruptcy, is also supportive of mobile, he said. “I certainly have not been asked by my board to stop doing what I am doing."

Beyond mobile, HDTV service is a critical component of any broadcast TV offering, Burgess and Fisher Communications CEO Colleen Brown said. “I was a skeptic [about HD] going into it before the digital transition and I've been blown away internally as having been wrong,” Burgess said. Ion’s viewership has surged both over-the-air and through pay-TV affiliates since it added HD, he said. HD is always going to be a part of Fisher’s core plan, “unless a much bigger and better idea comes along,” Brown said.

OMVC’s consumer showcase in Washington will begin in early May, though some “friends and family” are testing devices already, said Executive Director Anne Schelle. Already, device makers are getting more interested in putting mobile DTV chips into their portable devices, said Schelle and Danielle Levitas, group vice president of IDC’s consumer broadband and digital marketplace team. Levitas’s white paper on mobile DTV predicted device makers such as Dell, Samsung and LG will be the most aggressive.