President’s Memo

Posted on February 2, 2015 in ATSC News

Onward and Upward

We started the year with a bang! One January highlight was the 2015 International CES®, where the ATSC was proud to receive a technical Emmy (our third!) for developing the commercial sound limiting technology behind the Calm Act. Kudos to NBC Universal’s Jim Starzynski and Harmonic’s Pat Waddell for leading the groundbreaking A/85 effort. Whether or not you attended CES, you’ll want to check out “5 Cool Things from CES 2015 (And Why they Matter to ATSC) in this issue of THE STANDARD.

The past month saw significant continuing progress toward our aggressive goal of moving ATSC 3.0 to a Candidate Standard this year. Three worthy proponents came forward with Audio System proposals for ATSC 3.0, expected to be the world’s first television standard to incorporate Immersive Audio. And, big technical decisions were made for the Physical Layer, which will be the first ATSC 3.0 Candidate Standard later this spring. Drafting of the Physical Layer Candidate Standard, reflecting baseline transmission system parameters that now have been agreed to, is well under way.

While keeping that momentum going in the months ahead, we’re looking forward with enthusiasm for the 2015 ATSC Broadcast Television Conference. Please mark your calendars for May 15 at the Ronald Reagan Center in Washington for a full-day conference that will address the business opportunities enabled by next-generation television broadcasting. For those more technically inclined, the ATSC 3.0 Boot Camp on the eve of the conference (May 14) will provide a deep technical dive into the emerging standard.

The ATSC Boot Camp and Broadcast Technology Conference represent excellent opportunities for members to demonstrate their innovations behind the ATSC 3.0 standard. This is one of the many benefits of becoming a 2015 ATSC sponsor, and we welcome a wide range of video and audio demonstrations onsite for this key audience of broadcasting executives, innovators and media. To learn more about sponsorship and demonstration opportunities, please contact Lindsay Shelton-Gross at the ATSC.

Successfully moving forward with ATSC 3.0 depends on the broad participation of our members, and it’s gratifying to see the tremendous and ever-growing involvement of hundreds of talented individuals and their companies.  Equally important is engagement with key stakeholders, particularly broadcasting executives, to share perspectives on television’s future. We look forward to meeting with many of them in informal ATSC roundtables being planned for April’s 2015 NAB Show, where I am pleased to announce that the ATSC Technology Pavilion at the NAB Show is already sold out.

February promises to be another very busy month with productive work continuing on all ATSC 3.0 fronts including, management and protocol layers, preparations for audio system testing, video, watermarking and extensive ongoing physical layer efforts.  Fasten your seatbelts for a fun ride ahead.

Mark Richer, ATSC President

Posted in ATSC News