Questions Abound in DTS Withdrawal of Its ATSC 3.0 Audio Proposal

“DTS believes strongly in the ATSC’s vision for a next generation broadcast system to provide a new level of immersion, interactivity and personalization for broadcasters and consumers,” spokesman Jordan Miller emailed us Sunday. “Based on this belief, we proposed the DTS:X solution for ATSC 3.0. We designed DTS:X to provide the highest quality consumer experience for today and into the future across a wide range of media delivery platforms. While we are confident DTS:X represents a complete technology package that would meet the broadcast needs of the ATSC and its constituents, we have made the decision to respectfully withdraw from consideration at this time to focus on opportunities in global markets and other forward-looking standards.”

DTS looks forward “to remaining an active participant” in ATSC’s S34-2 ad hoc group on ATSC 3.0 audio, “and ATSC as a whole, to ensure ATSC 3.0 achieves its vision of a high quality, forward-looking broadcast framework that supports choice and innovation for all,” Miller said. “Respecting the confidentiality of the ATSC 3.0 process, we will provide no further comment.”

Despite withdrawing DTS:X from ATSC 3.0 audio contention, DTS is still showcasing the immersive and personalized audio attributes of the DTS:X codec at its NAB Show booth on the upper floor of the Las Vegas Convention Center's South Hall. Though "it's unfortunate we had to withdraw" DTS:X from ATSC 3.0 consideration, the DTS:X display at the NAB Show is to trumpet the technology as well suited to a range of broadcast business models, David McIntyre, DTS vice president-corporate strategy and development, told us Monday at the booth. But he cited the "confidentiality" of ATSC proceedings in declining to answer all of our questions about the company's withdrawal of DTS:X, even simple questions, such as the date DTS informed ATSC management of its decision. McIntyre echoed the DTS corporate line when he said the company remains very supportive of the ATSC 3.0 process and will remain an active participant in its standards-making.

In Q&A during an ATSC 3.0 “tutorial” session Sunday at the NAB Show’s Broadcast Engineering Conference, we asked Madeleine Noland, the LG consultant who chairs the S34 specialist group to which S34-2 reports, if she could explain DTS' withdrawal, which now leaves Dolby Labs and the MPEG-H audio consortium of Fraunhofer, Qualcomm and Technicolor as the only contestants. Onstage, she deferred to Rich Chernock, the Triveni Digital chief science officer who chairs the ATSC 3.0 effort, for an answer. With a smirk, Chernock, also onstage, replied with a polite “no.”

Though it’s characteristic of any standards-setting process that proponents will drop out along the way or merge their systems with those of other proponents, the DTS withdrawal is stranger than most. As recently as last month, all three ATSC 3.0 audio system proponents, including DTS, delivered their detailed system proposals on time by the March 9 deadline, marking the formal beginning of S34-2's review (see 1503100018).

Late January, DTS broke its silence on DTS:X by confirming to us that the new object-based surround technology would be a “core component” of its ATSC 3.0 audio submission (see 1501220023). But its statement then said DTS believes that ATSC 3.0 audio “should be a multi-codec choice and not a single mandatory solution.” That’s because “choice, innovation and competition are important to ATSC and broadcasters, and a framework for multiple audio codecs will be key to allowing broadcasters to choose the solution that best matches their needs," DTS said then. "This will ensure that ATSC can remain at the forefront of technology in the face of competing systems, and ensure consumer-electronics manufacturers are not beholden to a single, mandatory technology provider.” It’s anyone’s guess whether DTS’ advocacy for a multi-codec choice on ATSC 3.0 audio played any role in its decision to withdraw the DTS:X proposal.

ATSC 3.0, when it becomes a candidate standard by year-end 2015, will comprise “a number of documents,” Chernock said in Sunday’s tutorial session. ATSC’s various specialist groups decided this would be preferable to releasing “a monolithic, very large document that will become impossible to maintain and revise and upgrade as time goes on,” he said. “Expect probably four or five actual standards and parts.” The first component of ATSC 3.0's physical layer, a “system discovery and signaling” document, went out for balloting April 8, Chernock said. Other documents, including separate ones for the physical layer’s downlink and uplink components, which are in draft form, “will be coming along in their time, and all going through this process,” he said.

ATSC 3.0's “next steps” besides “obviously completing the standard” will include developing “practical transition scenarios” and working on “business plans,” Chernock said. “There’s going to be a lot of new business opportunities. There’s also a regulatory piece we’re hoping will be small. But that’s outside ATSC. It’s not technical. It’s being looked at by a lot of other people.”

Chernock thinks there’s “very good cross talk and cooperation between ATSC and CEA,” he said. “There are a lot of CE manufacturers who are involved in actually writing the standards, and there’s groups at CEA with close liaisons. So we’re not fighting each other, we’re working together.”