I keep reading that linear broadcasting is in an inevitable decline, but it doesn’t have to be. 

The jackpot market that can save the industry is the ability to broadcast and datacast directly to wireless mobile devices including 300 million-plus smartphones and over 200 million tablets in the U.S. But we have to be smart about the technology choice we make to get us there.

The 3GPP is a global standards organization that controls the technology that can be built into mobile devices. All mainstream wireless device manufacturers adhere to the 3GPP standards. 

3GPP approves only global standards, not regional standards. ATSC is a regional standard and has not been approved by 3GPP. Sinclair and others have tried, valiantly but unsuccessfully, to get ATSC added to the 3GPP standard. And I believe that the prospect of 3GPP changing its mind is nil.

The 3GPP standards do include a broadcast technology: 5G broadcast. Broadcasters that utilize 5G broadcast technology can broadcast to 5G broadcast TVs and can broadcast and datacast directly to 3GPP mobile devices. And new chips promise to increase the throughput of 5G broadcast to the point that it will exceed ATSC 3.0.   

5G broadcast is taking off in Europe, and 3GPP has approved a new spectrum band that includes all U.S. UHF broadcast channels.

Recently the broadcast industry announced a plan to force a transition to ATSC 3.0. It includes requiring consumers to buy new TVs, converter boxes or dongles that receive 3.0. But at the end of that transition, broadcasters still will not be able to broadcast or datacast directly to the half-billion devices waiting to receive broadcast programming and data and breathe exciting and lucrative new life into the industry.

This leads me to make a suggestion that I recognize will be unwelcome by all those who have worked so hard to make ATSC 3.0 a reality: If we are going to put consumers and the industry through a wrenching and difficult transition, wouldn’t it make more sense to transition to a technology that would open a vast new market for the broadcast industry and end all the talk about inevitable decline? That technology is 5G broadcast.

PS: I am not blaming anyone else for ATSC. I was on the NAB board and voted for it. At the time I had never heard of 3GPP and I suspect that the same is true of many of my fellow board members