The FCC should allow low-power TV (LPTV) broadcasters to use the 5G Broadcast transmission standard on a voluntary basis, said broadcaster HC2 in a petition for rulemaking Friday. The technology “allows an LPTV station to transmit a single 5G signal to its entire service area, which can be received by any compatible mobile device,” the petition said. “5G Broadcast thus provides both the spectrum efficiency of the one-to-many structure of broadcast operations and access to compatible mobile devices on existing 5G networks.” Currently, stations can only broadcast in the standard using an experimental license granted by the FCC, and only a few such stations exist.
Absent more FCC action on issues such as ownership and facilitating the ATSC 3.0 transition, the broadcast industry is quickly sliding toward a "period of catastrophic decline," FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington said Thursday. "We can't keep on the current trajectory" of stations closing and licenses falling into disuse, he said at a Media Institute event. The trend line on broadcaster bankruptcies is "a little bit like the beginning of a recession."
Consumers would pay more under an ATSC 3.0 tuner mandate, the Consumer Technology Association told an aide to FCC Chairman Brendan Carr and Media Bureau staff in an ex parte meeting last week, according to a filing posted Tuesday. NAB has called for a tuner requirement in its recent ATSC 3.0 petition (see 2502260051). A search of TVs sold by a nationwide retailer showed that the average price of those with 3.0 tuners was $80 higher than 1.0 models, CTA said. “Given this sample, in addition to other known factors, such as patent licensing costs, it is reasonable to conclude that consumers would pay more if all televisions were mandated to include an ATSC 3.0 tuner,” the filing said. CTA “strongly believes the transition to ATSC 3.0 must remain voluntary and market-based, not guided by government mandates, and has consistently advocated this position in the record.”
The FCC’s “In Re: Delete Delete Delete” proceeding could draw a huge number of response filings and is expected to require numerous subsequent rulemakings to lead to actual changes, said industry officials and academics. “Every single regulated entity will sit on Santa's lap and ask for presents,” said TechFreedom Senior Counsel Jim Dunstan. “It will take months just to sift through all the asks and determine how to proceed.”
NAB’s call for an ATSC 3.0 tuner mandate (see 2502260051) is “highly concerning” and a reversal of its stance in a 2017 joint petition with CTA and others, which requested FCC authorization of the new standard, CTA said in a meeting last week with aides to Commissioner Nathan Simington, according to an ex parte filing posted Tuesday. “The key element” of that 2017 joint petition “was the voluntary nature of the transition,” CTA said, adding that it “strongly believes the transition to ATSC 3.0 must remain voluntary and market-based, not guided by government mandates.”
The FCC shouldn't act as a “Ministry of Truth,” and there isn't a constitutional basis for the agency to go after local broadcasters, said Commissioner Nathan Simington during an interview Tuesday that seemed aimed at soothing broadcasters' concerns about the FCC's new direction. “I’m not in the business of deciding who’s telling the truth and who’s not,” Simington said onstage at the NAB State Leadership Conference. “And what’s more, [FCC Chairman Brendan] Carr thinks the same way." Carr said last week that FCC precedent set by the previous administration supports proceedings he has opened against broadcast networks over their programming and news content.
TV broadcast executives during Q4 earnings calls last week were bullish on merger and acquisition opportunities under the new White House and FCC leadership, but several also mentioned “softness” in some advertising categories, possibly connected to tariffs. Concern with tariffs is “putting a natural chilling effect upon advertising in the automobile sector” but should eventually “settle out,” said Gray Media co-CEO Hilton Howell.
The FCC should establish a timeline for a nationwide TV transition to ATSC 3.0, with stations in the top 55 markets -- covering 70% of the U.S. population -- shifting to 3.0-only broadcasts by February 2028, NAB said in a petition for rulemaking Wednesday. Under the proposed timeline, the remaining markets would transition to 3.0 -- which ATSC 1.0 TVs can't receive without a converter -- by February 2030. The petition also asks the FCC to change its rules to require new TVs to be able to tune ATSC 3.0 channels and require manufacturers to make accessing broadcast channels easier on new devices. “Without decisive and immediate action, the transition risks stalling and the realistic window for implementation could pass,” NAB said in the petition. “The time for half-measures is over.”
The NAB-led multistakeholder ATSC 3.0 task force, The Future of TV Initiative (FOTI), released its final report Friday, but the document offers few actionable recommendations and shows little new agreement among stakeholders (see 2501090047). “The report will provide the FCC with a better understanding of stakeholders’ outstanding issues and concerns as it moves forward with the rulemakings necessary to complete the transition and will help focus the efforts of industry as they continue to deploy ATSC 3.0,” NAB said in a news release Friday.
The NAB’s ATSC 3.0 task force, The Future of TV Initiative (see 2408300030), is expected to produce a final report “soon” members said, but broadcasters told us much of the impetus behind the effort has faded due to the coming leadership change at the FCC. Commissioner Brendan Carr, the agency's chairman-designate, is seen as more favorable to the 3.0 transition, broadcasters said. The task force first met in June 2023, and members said it would issue a final report in fall 2024. “It is a daunting effort to put that report together in a way that everyone can sign off on the language,” said Robert Folliard, a task force member and Gray Media senior vice president-government relations and distribution. “We expect the report to come out very soon,” an NAB spokesperson said.