Date Remains Vague for Mobile DTV Launch by OMVC Alliance
LAS VEGAS -- No specific date was provided for the U.S. launch of mobile DTV by members of the Open Mobile Video Coalition at a news conference at CES Thursday. The group said only that the launch will come in 2009. But it did announce other plans for the initial broadcaster rollout. Participating companies demonstrated mobile DTV for the first time at the show using the candidate standard recently chosen by the group after the ATSC Mobile DTV standard setting process.
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Harris Corp. said its ATSC mobile DTV technology platform for broadcasters and CE manufacturers is “expected to be available within the next 60 days.” Choon Lee, vice president of LG Electronics and director of the LG DTV Laboratory, said he’s “pleased with the progress.”
LG is showing prototype mobile DTV devices at CES. They include the first ATSC mobile DTV MP3 player, with a 3-inch touch screen display; a portable DVD player with a 7-inch wide LCD swivel screen and integrated ATSC mobile DTV tuner; a mobile phone with a 3-inch touch display; a mobile phone with a 2.8-inch touch screen and QWERTY keyboard; and a USB dongle receiver for laptop PCs. The MP3 player market is a “new category for us in the U.S.,” although it has shipped devices elsewhere, an LG spokesman told Consumer Electronics Daily. LG didn’t give shipping dates. The company said it’s still discussing with retailers the launch of the product line. Other manufacturers planning to introduce mobile DTV products include Samsung, Kenwood, Delphi, Visteon and Hyundai-Kia.
Mobile carriers have their own mobile DTV strategies. The coalition said it’s in discussions with the carriers.
Broadcasters will launch mobile DTV on 63 stations in 22 markets, covering 35 percent of U.S. TV homes, said Brandon Burgess, the coalition’s president and Ion Media Networks’ CEO. The technology will provide live, local and national over-the-air DTV to consumers over next-generation mobile and portable devices, he said. The first TV stations will be 14 affiliates of NBC, nine each of ABC, CBS and Ion, five of Fox and four each of the CW MyNetworkTV. Nine PBS stations are also “in discussions with the OMVC to join the 2009 launch,” it said.
“The $60,000 question” is what the mobile DTV business model will look like, Burgess said at the news conference. “The easiest” model at first is making the service available to consumers free, he said. But subscriptions are possible down the line.