ATSC 3.0 on Path to Making Money; Broadcasters Urge Patience

LAS VEGAS -- ATSC 3.0 is finally in a position to generate cash for TV stations and remains the industry’s hope, according to interviews with broadcasters and several 3.0 product announcements at NAB Show 2024. However, not everyone is convinced and even 3.0 supporters concede the transition still faces challenges. “We need a date certain” for the end of the FCC’s substantially similar requirements, said BitPath CEO John Hane. “If we had some relatively minor adjustments in the transition rules, a lot more stations would be converted.” “I’m sure it’s gonna pan out, it just won’t happen as fast as Americans like,” said Byron Allen, Allen Media CEO, in an interview.

Sinclair Broadcast on Sunday announced a deal with content delivery network Edgio to use Sinclair’s spectrum in part to deliver 4K video to connected TVs. “Everyone has waited for datacasting’s promise to be fulfilled. That time has now arrived,” said Sinclair CEO Chris Ripley at a news conference Sunday. Sinclair also announced the creation of a datacasting platform -- called Broadspan -- to allow businesses to distribute data to any device with a 3.0 receiver. On Friday, broadcast consortium Pearl TV announced that a coalition of broadcasters -- including Sinclair, Tegna, Hearst and Gray -- have invested in a platform designed to standardize app development and audience measurement for 3.0, called Run3TV, and Monday Pearl announced a slate of interactive TV channels for 3.0 stations.

NAB and Sinclair also announced progress in using ATSC 3.0 as a backup for GPS. Called BPS (broadcast positioning system), that project has drawn support from officials at the National Institute for Standards and Technology and the Department of Transportation (see 2304170012). Federal agencies have solicited proposals for a backup to GPS, and broadcasters could eventually receive federal dollars to maintain such a system, said NAB Chief Technology Officer Sam Matheny. BitPath CEO John Hane told us Sunday that he expects BitPath to launch its precision GPS tech -- which allows for drone deliveries to specific coordinates, among other uses -- later this year.

Some broadcasters at NAB Show 2024 told us that seven years after the FCC authorized the standard, it has taken too long for concrete ways to monetize ATSC 3.0 to materialize. The failure to get most phone manufacturers to incorporate the technology means 3.0 isn’t the future of broadcasting, said Dean Marini, general manager of low-power TV station WIVM-LD Akron-Canton, Ohio. “Our audience is aging,” said Marini, a supporter of 5G broadcast. Younger viewers aren’t going to make use of tech that isn’t on mobile phones, and 3.0 doesn’t facilitate the local focus necessary for broadcasting, Marini said. One small broadcaster told us he is waiting to move to 3.0 until he can see that it offers monetary rewards. Larger broadcasters, with publicly traded companies, are incentivized to present an overly optimistic forecast for the tech, the broadcaster said

Most broadcasters told us they still had faith in 3.0. “It’s essential for us,” said Graham Media CEO Catherine Badalamente in an interview. Though Graham doesn’t have the large numbers of stations to cover huge chunks of the country that Sinclair and Nexstar have, 3.0 is worthwhile for access to the viewer data and metrics that advertisers want and to provide an improved viewer experience, she said. “Are we slow to market? Absolutely, and it's frustrating,” Badalamente said. “I understand why broadcasters would be frustrated about when this is coming, but we just built the thing,” said Gray Television Senior Vice President Rob Folliard. He said the 3.0 transition is ahead of where the digital television transition was after a similar period of time, in terms of number of sold devices, available channels and other metrics. “There’s more happening in a voluntary transition. We can move faster.”

Numerous TV broadcasters told us they viewed Sinclair’s announcement of a datacasting customer as a very positive sign for 3.0. Sinclair’s release Sunday included a one-page promo pitched to solicit additional customers: “LEVERAGE OUR SERVICES FOR YOUR BUSINESS NEEDS,” it read. Edgio CTO Eric Black said Sunday that his company hopes to use the capacity offered by Sinclair’s datacasting to attract large streaming services that need to transmit massive amounts of data. Though the Broadspan platform currently includes only Sinclair’s 3.0 stations, Ripley said the product depends on nationwide reach, and he expects other broadcasters to incorporate their stations into the datacasting network as well. Scripps Vice President-Strategy and Business Development Kerry Oslund said in an interview that those sorts of negotiations among broadcasters are ongoing, and compared them to the roaming arrangements reached among wireless providers. Such deals “are new to us, but they aren’t new at all,” Oslund said. When additional companies join their networks to datacast with Sinclair, they will share in the revenue from Edgio and other datacasting customers, Ripley said.

The Run3TV platform will allow outside developers to create apps for 3.0 by standardizing the requirements, said Pearl TV Managing Director Anne Schelle. Apps created for 3.0 using Run3TV will work on all 3.0 receivers, a contrast to other app ecosystems where separate versions must be created for each device, said ROXi CEO Rob Lewis. ROXi has developed an interactive music video channel and a pilot “TikTok style” interactive news broadcast for 3.0, according to news releases Monday. Though the channels are broadcast, viewers will be able to start a program from the beginning, Lewis said. The music video channel and other interactive channels will be distributed nationwide by the broadcasters that make up PearlTV, which include Sinclair, Scripps and Nexstar, said a ROXi news release.

Numerous broadcasters said they need the FCC to relax requirements that they broadcast substantially similar content on their 3.0 and 1.0 stations for the transition to proceed. Sunsetting ATSC 1.0 “is a major objective for just about every broadcaster I know,” said Ripley. “It’s something we’re going to be pushing for with the FCC to figure out when would that day be.” The NAB-stewarded and FCC-involved task force on the ATSC 3.0 transition -- the Future of TV Initiative -- could lead to the FCC setting a date certain for a 1.0 sunset, said BitPath's Hane, who is on the task force. That group is encouraging stakeholders to have discussions and move closer together, he said. “You’re not going to reach consensus with warring pleadings at the FCC,” he said.

The Future of TV Initiative is considering a host of “major challenges” on 3.0, including encryption and the standard’s lack of backwards compatibility, said FCC Media Bureau Video Division Chief Barbara Kreisman at a panel Monday. Consumers losing access to broadcasts or having to replace their TVs is a “serious concern,” she said. Kreisman said that the digital TV transition offered consumers tangible benefits that outweighed the costs. “The question is, what is 3.0 going to do for me as a normal consumer?”