NAB Not Seeking Mandate on FM Chip Activations in Smartphones, It Says Again at NAB Show

That NAB regularly has communicated with regulators its concerns about the low rate of FM chip activations in smartphones doesn’t mean NAB has changed its position and is now seeking FM chip mandates, Skip Pizzi, NAB senior director-new media technologies, told us at the NAB Show. Rather than seeking mandates, NAB’s aim is to convince the FCC to use “its good offices” to encourage wireless carriers to activate the FM chips already embedded in most new smartphones and to endorse the NextRadio FM smartphone app, Pizzi told us. A just-completed NAB analysis released at the NAB Show found roughly two-thirds of the smartphones sold in the U.S. in 2014 with FM chips embedded weren't activated, and of those, 75 percent were iPhones (see 1504120004). NAB previously stated its policy of not seeking a mandate on FM chips in smartphones last month when it said FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler erred in House testimony when he suggested broadcasters were seeking such mandates (see 1503200031). Pizzi's denial that NAB was now seeking mandates came amid several references he made in his NAB Show talk that NAB has conferred regularly with regulators over the FM smartphone chip activations issue. Moreover, NAB President Gordon Smith, in his NAB Show opening keynote, juxtaposed expressions of NAB support for the NextRadio campaign on landing more FM chip activations in smartphones with the promise that "winning our legislative and regulatory battles on Capitol Hill and at the FCC ensures broadcasters will be able to capitalize on these innovations."