Sky invested $6 million in fuboTV, a U.S.-based video streaming service that provides “a premium, over-the-top bundle” of sports TV channels, Sky said in a Thursday announcement. Though it launched just a little more than a year ago, fuboTV “has quickly become the second largest aggregator and distributor of linear OTT sports content in the U.S., growing to more than 40,000 subscribers,” Sky said. The service is available in English, Spanish and Portuguese through a range of platforms and devices, and has landed U.S. distribution deals with TV channels that hold rights to major worldwide sporting events, including live soccer matches from more than half of the leading international leagues and tournaments, Sky said.

Lockheed Martin and Orbcomm plan to jointly pursue machine-to-machine business opportunities that use satellite or hybrid satellite/cellular networks, they said in a news release Thursday. Lockheed Martin Space Systems Vice President-Strategy and Advanced Programs Dave Markham said that "the vision of the Internet of Things promises to change how society benefits from machines embedded with greater intelligence, improving the decisions organizations make and ultimately the quality of service delivered to their end users." The companies said that they will focus on the government sector, with the collaboration potentially involving joint business development and new services.

AT&T’s announcement that DirecTV will beam all four rounds of next month's Masters golf tournament in Ultra HD (see 1603090060) “is terrific and will spur further interest” in 4K TVs, CTA President Gary Shapiro emailed us Wednesday. But Shapiro stopped well short of calling the DirecTV initiative a “tipping point” for Ultra HD as he had called the launch of ESPN HD and its impact on HDTV adoption. Ultra HD 4K TVs are “already successful, consumers are buying millions of sets and it is doing great as more programmers realize consumers love it!” Shapiro said.

FTC requests for DirecTV consumer complaint documentation are "relevant but overbroad," U.S. Magistrate Judge Maria-Elena James of San Francisco said in a discovery order Tuesday, telling the company and agency to meet again about ways to narrow the request scope. The two had disagreed about documentation (see 1603040021) as part of the FTC's 2015 lawsuit against DirecTV for allegedly not properly communicating early cancellation fee terms to subscribers (see 1503110042). In her order, James also said DirecTV and the FTC should discuss DirecTV's argument about redaction of personal consumer information "unless the FTC can make a compelling showing as to its relevancy."

In-flight connectivity company executives threw a number of verbal elbows at one another over data capacity and the future of air-to-ground (ATG) connectivity, at a panel Tuesday at Satellite 2016. "Some of the exaggeration is going to come back and bite some of us," said Leo Mondale, Inmarsat president-aviation. Air passengers want the same kind of connectivity they get on the ground, Mondale said, but "I don't know if there's enough [demand] to float the boat of everyone up here [on the panel]." Mondale and Gogo Chief Technology Officer Anand Chari went back and forth with Don Buchman, ViaSat general manager-commercial mobility, on ViaSat's in-flight broadband offering on JetBlue and United. Chari and Mondale called it "a marketing stunt." "It's not a claim -- just buy a ticket on JetBlue," Buchman said. Chari said that alongside Gogo's efforts on the launch of its 2Ku satellite connectivity service (see 1508240040), it's also working on its next-generation ATG, which includes its interest in the air-to-ground mobile broadband spectrum it asked the FCC to auction (see 1503100047). Financially, ATG becomes viable compared to satellite in-flight connectivity if there is adequate spectrum -- which Gogo doesn't currently have, Chari said. Cost of spectrum "is what swings this thing from reasonable to unreasonable," said David Bruner, Panasonic Aviation vice president-global communications services.

Ultra HD needs strict standards and policing of those standards to prevent what happened in the HD market, where non-HD screens were sold as HD, said Antonio Arcidiacono, Eutelsat director-innovation, during an Ultra HD panel Tuesday at the Satellite 2016 conference in National Harbor, Maryland. There already have been signs of such problems, such as sale of 2K Blu-ray discs as 4K, he said. "If you fool the customers, the market will not grow." While Ultra HD lacks a clear definition, traits beyond just higher definition -- from wider color space and higher frame rates to immersive sound -- when put together, "you get the 'wow' factor," said Peter Siebert, executive director of the DVB Project. He said industry specifications have been worked out cooperatively for the high-resolution areas, and now there's work being done on specifications for high dynamic range, high frame rate and related matters. The market is seeing Ultra HD TVs "somewhat in advance of our ability to deliver content to them," said Steve Richeson, Advantech Wireless senior vice president-global sales and business development. He said "4K seems to be customer pull." But the satellite industry is somewhat dropping the Ultra HD ball, with Netflix having launched service in 4K, said Arcidiacono. Satellite providers need to better promote Ultra HD, though the industry has launched some Ultra HD channels, he said.

Gogo is partnering with Intelsat to "leverage the first shared [geosynchronous/low Earth orbit] satellite network for in-flight connectivity," Gogo said in a news release Monday. Gogo will expand its use of Intelsat's network in 2016 by buying additional Ku-band capacity, it said. Gogo said Intelsat network infrastructure will "initially include use of traditional wide beam services and the ... high throughput satellite" Intelsat EpicNG platform, which is expected to become operational this year.

Gogo wants special temporary authority (STA) to allow up to 200 earth station aboard aircraft (ESAA) terminals to communicate with satellites Intelsat 18 and Yamal 401, it said in an FCC International Bureau filing Thursday. Gogo said it needs the STA to meet customer demand for in-flight connectivity in the South Pacific and over Russia while its application to modify to ESAA is pending before the FCC. Neither satellite will be used in U.S. airspace, Gogo said.

A coalition of 13 satellite industry organizations urged presidential candidates to ensure that U.S. leadership in space continues. They asked that America “maintain and expand internationally harmonized spectrum access for space.” In what the groups called an unprecedented collaboration by the industry organizations, their four-page action plan said that “given the significant infrastructure development and investment [the U.S. has made] it is critical to have predictable and stable regulatory access to spectrum." They also backed a long-term budget plan since they said erratic federal government budgeting has led to “cost and schedule inefficiencies.” Representatives of three of the groups discussed the plan Friday at the National Press Club: American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics Executive Director Sandra Magnus, Space Foundation CEO Elliot Pulham and Commercial Spaceflight Federation President Eric Stallmer. The plan from those groups, the Satellite Industry Association and others said U.S. space leadership is at risk. Among recommendations are reducing barriers to international trade and expanding internationally harmonized spectrum access for space.

DirecTV and the FTC are at loggerheads over the agency's requests for consumer complaints documents as part of its 2015 lawsuit alleging DirecTV wasn't properly communicating early cancellation fee terms to subscribers (see 1503110042). In a letter brief filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, the FTC -- which is seeking a court order compelling DirecTV to produce the documents -- said consumer complaint evidence "has direct bearing on DirecTV's misconduct" and its burden arguments "are even less persuasive in light of DirecTV's refusal to accept numerous FTC proposals to reasonably limit the company's burden in responding." DirecTV said the commission is seeking literally billions of records by requesting every communication between DirecTV and its customers: "The task of gathering, reviewing and redacting these communications ... would be oppressive." It also said it offered to provide "a relevant set" of its Office of the President complaint files and all notes from its Rio Main Bank customer service notes system relating to those complaints. "These complaints are representative of the type of complaints all consumers raise with the company," DirecTV said, saying the FTC's motion should be denied.