Here's a question for you? Are there any equipment companies left that understand the needs of broadcasters? I just read that TFT is going out of business. It seems to me that there aren't a lot of companies left who stake their entire viability on the needs of broadcasters. Not much of a future in that. And who does that leave to invest in the future of radio?
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DTS to Acquire iBiquity for Some $172 Million
- Thread starter RBR-TVBR Buzz Stream
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Here's a question for you? Are there any equipment companies left that understand the needs of broadcasters? I just read that TFT is going out of business. It seems to me that there aren't a lot of companies left who stake their entire viability on the needs of broadcasters. Not much of a future in that. And who does that leave to invest in the future of radio?
I guess the most recent example that comes to mind is GatesAir, who was split off from the much larger Harris Corp. Harris' true bread and butter was government and US defense business. But just as a broadcast equipment division, Harris just couldn't make their numbers. The final straw leading up to 2009, was the promise of massive business around the DTV migration, which never materialized as expected for Harris Broadcast Division, so on the block it went. Harris sold the broadcast group to Private Equity for pennies on the dollar. GatesAir is probably the only remaining manufacturer capable of being a one-stop-shop from microphone to antenna, thanks to Harris buying up lots of smaller niche' companies, placing these companies under their big tent and all the while accumulating big debt. The problem is though, not many new stations being built and those being updated are looking for lowest cost through group buying arrangements.
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diymedia
Guest
As in direct cash subsidies? Sure. But there lending staff and investing in research to bring more functionality to the HD system...those are subsidies, too.
What "lending of staff" went on at the station operator level? What "investing in research" was done by stations themselves?
Sure, stations gave feedback to iBiquity on HD operations, but mostly via the manufacturer of the HD equipment that they installed... BE, Nautel, Harris, etc.
There were no "direct cash subsidies". There was an initial investment in the form of what many called "seed capital" which, among other things, showed venture capital firms that there was a commitment to HD by the major broadcast companies.
Yep David is correct. I was involved in some of the original testing merely as an interested party, representing the interests of the station group I worked for. Coincidentally, the station group I worked for was not one of the groups that invested in IBOC/HD, nor were part of the original HD Alliance.
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diymedia
Guest
Yay, word-parsing FTW. Glynn Walden hopped back and forth between iBiquity and CBS.
How about those ratings and revenue figures?
Glynn was not "shared". He left KYW and CBS corporat, worked for as a co-founder for USA Digital and then iBiquity for many years and then returned to CBS as DoE until retirement.
I gave you several examples and told you billings in transactional markets are based on ratings as well as a number of other factors.
If you want more examples, do your own research. One of the quarterly BIA books can be had for a bit over $1000 or a subscription to Media Access Pro is around the low 5 figures. .
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diymedia
Guest
So the best answers I can get is anecdotal information, or I should invest 4-5 figures in industry datasets to find out the answer for myself. If HD-to-analog rebroadcasting via translator is such a robust plank of the HD platform, don't you think folks more bullish on HD than me (a non-hater, BTW) would have dug them out to shout from the rooftops? That's okay, I know, this all silly talk. But thanks for the conversation.
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K.M. Richards
Guest
If David quotes figures, they are not anecdotal. He has access to all of the data he references. The lack of such access on your part is no reason to dismiss his information.
Most business information comes at a cost because some company invested money in compiling it.
I gave you a few examples that show how HD-2 originated translators are getting considerable shares of audience in some big PPM markets. I only gave a couple, although they are real, not anecdotal, because I am using data "I" paid for that I am not going to give you for free. One thing is a couple of "fair use" examples; anything else would be in violation of "my" usage of the data.
However, I gave you enough information... verifiable in the free, online Nielsen reports... for a conclusion to be made that using an HD-2 to program an FM translator gets real, salable shares.
My caveat is, simply, that each operation that does get shares with HD-2 stations and translators will be profitable to the extent that the shares are well sold by the station sellers and that the format used is itself salable.
Another example, which has been the source of many news posts in the last few months is the use of HD + Translator combos to bring alternative to markets where either Cumulus or iHeart have facilities. Alternative is an underperforming format for new conversions on full signals and does not offer a good ROI based on the station's stick value. But on a very inexpensive translator, it adds a point or two to a company's cluster share and is a very profitable extension of the cluster reach.
If you don't like my "expert opinion"... opinions that have kept a roof over my head for decades... then spend the money and get the same sources I use to build a foundation for my views.
An interesting example of how the HD2-tranlator thing works well is here in the Washington DC area. WAMU, the local NPR affiliate licensed to American University, has an HD2 that features bluegrass country. About three years ago they were rebroadcasting their HD2 via an analog translator in the DC area and seeing pretty impressive numbers. As HD use in the area continued to grow, listeners who discovered the format eventually migrated over to the HD2 stream on WAMU, so when the deal ran out on leasing the translator, the listener base and grown enough on their HD2 channel that WAMU could let the translator go.
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diymedia
Guest
Hold up a sec. Nobody's disputing David's access to information or voluminous knowledge about many subjects in radio. i was just saying that, if HD has indeed found a groove through the tactic of the HD-on-translator play I'd expect folks would be quite open to publicizing that beyond industry datasets that aren't generally accessible to the public and, you know, sharing tactics and strategies with the rest of the industry. Haven't seen that yet, but maybe it's coming.
Then again, ad hominems are popular around here.
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Darth_vader
Guest
So does this mean now I'll have the pleasure of hearing lossy HEAAC-on-disk soundtracks when I go to see a movie, instead of glorious PCM-on-disk? As if Sony and Dolby hadn't caused enough fidelity degradation in cinema audio with their own proprietary lossy codecs.
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