STATIONS ANXIOUS FOR MOBILE AND ITS REVENUE

The Open Mobile Video Coalition packed a hotel ballroom Monday at the NAB Show with more than 450 broadcasters eager to hear updates about progress being made to establish standards for the delivery of television signals to cellphones and other mobile devices using the existing digital spectrum.

“We're on track to have the technology ready for the February transition,” declared Brandon Burgess, president of the OMVC and CEO of Ion Media Networks. Burgess has tirelessly spearheaded the cause of digital mobile television since last year’s NAB gathering.

OMVC, which represents over 800 stations, was formed to accelerate the development of mobile TV. It said the industry is on track to develop standards and launch services for mobile DTV in 2009, stating that the recent Independent Demonstration of Viability (IDOV) field trials proved that DTV based mobile video technologies are not only feasible, but  also that they in no way interfere with regular DTV signals or impede the ability to transmit HDTV.

The successful trials, said the coalition, were conducted in March and April in the San Francisco and Las Vegas markets. OMVC plans to deliver a report on the trials to the ATSC by May 15, meeting the organization's deadline for setting a standard.

Three sets of vendors submitted products for the tests: LG Electronics and Harris, developers of the MPH system; Samsung and Rohde & Schwarz, which developed the A-VSB technology; and Thomson and Micronas, which devised yet a third system.

The NAB breakfast meeting included a panel discussion led by NBC News legal correspondent Dan Abrams. The participants were Burgess; John Eck, president, NBC TV Network and Media Works, NBC Universal; Lynn Beall, executive vice president, Gannett Broadcasting; and Alan Frank, NAB Television Board chairman and president of Post-Newsweek Stations.

Eck pointed out that while consumers are used to the idea of getting video over their cellphones from services like Verizon's V Cast, “they're not used to getting it live” the way broadcasters will do it, and they're not used to getting local services.

It is precisely this experience that broadcasters can monetize, OMVC maintains. Jim Conshafter, senior vice president, Media General Broadcast Group, presented findings of a report from BIA Financial Network, which estimates that revenue potential of mobile digital television for broadcasters will be $2 billion-a-year business in 2012 from advertising alone. The keys, he said, are local content, lower cost of providing the service, and existing relationships with local advertisers.

“In this room you have under one roof the people who have already build the infrastructure for mobile television,” said Burgess. “It's easier for us to go to market compared to some of the other efforts being made out there. We have the spectrum, we have the content. We need device makers and retailers to sell the devices.”

“The bottom line is that mobile DTV is real and working,” said Sterling Davis, vice president of  engineering, Cox Communications. “There's no reason why we can't be up and running by February.”

Davis noted that the advent of transmission to mobile devices does nothing to change the bandwidth that stations use. What broadcasters need to do, however, is come to grips with the fact that they're entering the business of managing that bandwidth to maximize its potential. “This will become a bit-management situation at each individual station.”

Pleased with the turnout at the meeting, Burgess told TVNewsCheck that last year “I was running around trying to convince people this was a good idea. I think we've come a long way, both in terms of our membership as well as getting the entire ecosystem interested. We're inventing a whole new business model on top of an existing model.”

“We don't have a lot of huge obstacles in front of us, just a lot of hard work to do,” said Beall. “Our industry is recognizing that we have to continue to serve those consumers out there who want information wherever, whenever and on whatever device they choose.”

Beall, who is on OMVC's executive board, was instrumental in contracting Anne Schelle as the organization's Washington-based executive director. OMVC is funded by membership dues and the NAB. MSTV paid for the IDOV trials.