Over-the-air television broadcasting in the United States is poised for the scheduled shut-off date of all high power analog transmissions on February 17, 2009. This event is causing excitement among broadcasters as they consider the many different uses of their spectrum bandwidth that are now possible with digital television (DTV).

Already television broadcasters have used a portion of their 6 MHz channel for other purposes such as multicasting several signals and datacasting and these services have delivered noticeable revenues. Yet the potential for further revenues is quite promising when considering the additional usage of the digital channel to broadcast directly to mobile and/or handheld receivers, often referred to as M/H DTV. (note: In this report, “M/H DTV” refers to the proposed technologies vying for the ATSC M/H standard.)

What is most interesting about this application are the various mobile devices that could receive an M/H DTV signal in the future. These include mobile phones, laptop computers, and other video receivers in the hands of consumers (e.g., adapted video iPods, video receivers in automobiles). This technical ability coupled with the content that broadcasters consistently aggregate and air on their main signal could provide a great supply of content that would be attractive to individuals using any type of mobile and video devices.

However, in order to develop material M/H DTV revenues, there are some pragmatic concerns.

First, there are a large number of stakeholders (e.g., cellular network operators, content rights holders, chip set manufacturers, consumer electronics companies, handset manufacturers, vehicle manufacturers) with whom broadcasters will have to interact successfully to build this business. This interaction needs to be in the form of a viable digital media ecosystem in which each type of company has a clear role, interoperates well with the other types of companies, creates value for itself and the others in the ecosystem and is sustainable over time.

Second, receiving the existing over-the-air television signal in a mobile environment, using either the analog or digital signal, is possible but fraught with problems such as interruptions in service or leaving a potential market unserved by local broadcasters.

Third, other entrants using different spectrum have entered into this marketplace and there are plans for others to enter as well.

Given these developments, the NAB FASTROAD (www.nabfastroad.org) technology advocacy program commissioned BIA Financial Network (BIAfn) to examine these issues.  (Joe Kraemer of LECG was a joint author of the NAB report.)  The study’s purpose was to evaluate whether or not the television broadcasting industry will be better served with a single mobile/handheld standard for DTV, rather than having several competing systems, and to consider whether market success is sensitive to the timing of such M/H DTV standardization.

Conclusions

BIAfn estimates that broadcast television could reap an additional $2 billion in annual revenue by 2012 delivering content to mobile and handheld devices if an industry standard is adopted and technology deployed quickly.