The “biggest thing” about ATSC 3.0 from Sony Electronics' “perspective” is that it’s “designed to last, to evolve and endure,” Paul Hearty, vice president-technology standards, told last week’s ATSC conference in Washington. “When we did ATSC 1.0, I think it took us nine very painful years,” said Hearty. ATSC 3.0 “has taken us six and a bit,” he said. “But 3.1, maybe it will be only a year or six months or eight months." The HTML5 “ship” at ATSC 3.0's IP core "sailed into our products, and we’re all supporting it,” Hearty said of the prevalence of smart TVs in the consumer tech market. “One of the challenges we’re going to have to face is that we’ve got to figure out how we’re going to accommodate the runtime platform” in ATSC 3.0 “with the platforms that we already have in our devices,” he said.

The ATSC 3.0 receiver chipsets that Saankhya Labs is developing on the “fast track” with Sinclair’s One Media (see 1703280044) should be available in time to be deployed in smartphones and other consumer products for the 2018 holiday selling season, Saankhya CEO Parag Naik told us Friday. “We’re discussing the scale,” and will know the timetable “in about a month’s time,” said Naik. Saankhya’s software-defined radio platform will allow for chips that can accommodate other global broadcast standards, he said. “Depending on the application, depending on the customer, we could have a different product mix” based on variations of the same chipset design, he said. “For example, the same chip could be used for fixed receivers,” like large-screen TVs, and “also gateways,” in addition to mobile devices like smartphones and tablets, he said. Naik sees the U.S. as hosting the first worldwide commercial deployment of the Saankhya chipsets for ATSC 3.0. In South Korea, which is scheduled to formally launch ATSC 3.0 services in a matter of days, “we are talking to OEMs there as well,” he said. Sinclair’s offer at last week’s ATSC conference to give out the receiver chips for free (see 1705170033) is part of an effort “to seed the market,” said Naik. Component costs are “a function of the volume,” he said. “Once the market gets seeded and critical mass is achieved, your costs will drop and it becomes ubiquitous, and almost everyone then will probably start to put it in his phones or TVs.”

The FCC Enforcement Bureau sent out five notices of unlicensed operation to suspected pirate radio operators Friday, said documents posted online Monday. The notices order the recipients to cease operating immediately and gives them 10 days to respond with evidence they're broadcasting under FCC authority. The unlicensed broadcasts occurred in April and May in New York, Dallas and three in New Jersey, the notices said.

Data on requested FM translator relocations shows Prometheus Radio Project’s rationale for asking the FCC to reconsider relaxing translator siting rules is “groundless,” NAB said in an opposition filing posted in docket 13-249 Monday. Since the order relaxing the rules, only one AM broadcaster out of 200 translator relocation applications sought to move a translator outside the previously required 40-mile limit, NAB said. That “hardly qualifies as the broad irreparable harm that Prometheus breathlessly claimed the Order would cause to [low-power] FM stations,” said NAB. “The Order will not cause LPFM stations to be boxed in, or negatively impacted in any way.” The association disputed Prometheus’ argument that doing away with the 40-mile limit wasn’t a logical outgrowth of the order, and argued against granting a stay or giving Prometheus an extension. “Prometheus was afforded ample notice and opportunity to prepare its reply, and does not offer any meaningful rationale for further delaying Commission action,” NAB said.

Eliminating the main studio rule “will favorably impact minority broadcasters,” said the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council (MMTC) in a news release Friday. An NPRM seeking comment on eliminating the rule was approved 3-0 Thursday (see 1705180066). Minority broadcasters often are located on the outskirts of communities of license because discrimination caused them to enter the industry later, when prime locations already had been snapped up, MMTC said. “Larger companies, who were earlier entrants, are able to maintain a single studio for all of their stations in larger cities, while smaller minority broadcasters frequently have to assemble a cluster of stations in more suburban areas” -- each of which has had to have its own ‘main studio’ at enormous expense,” MMTC said. Minority-owned broadcasters also are generally smaller operations, less able to absorb the costs of the staffing required by the main studio rule, the release said. The rule is a “disproportionately unfavorable, anti-minority market entry barrier,” MMTC said.

Attorneys for two broadcasters involved in a channel sharing deal that are also seeking to have a transaction approved by the FCC met with Media Bureau Chief Michelle Carey and her staff Wednesday, an ex parte filing said. Under the proposed deal, KWHY Los Angeles would buy its incentive auction-related channel sharing partner, KBEH(TV) Oxnard, California (see 1705090067). The stations expect the deal to be approved before they implement the sharing agreement, the broadcasters said. The deal would be a “like-kind exchange” for tax purposes, “pursuant to which KWHY would use the proceeds of its own auction sale to reinvest proceeds in the purchase of KBEH, as permitted under the tax laws,” the filing said (see 1511250050).

Stephen Colbert's calling President Donald Trump Vladimir Putin's "cock holster" (see 1705080032) means the FCC should investigate whether CBS is fit to own broadcast licenses before approving Entercom's purchase of CBS Radio, said Edward Stolz in a motion seeking permission to file supplementary comments. Stolz filed a petition to deny against the transaction, and previously opposed the license renewal of KDND(FM) Sacramento. "This broadcast brought the basic character qualifications of the principals of the CBS organization into question," he said. The FCC needs to investigate CBS Radio's "sister entity" before it can rule that approving the deal is in the public interest, Stolz said. CBS didn't comment.

Public interest groups are unlikely to prevail in their challenge of FCC restoration of its UHF ownership cap discount rules, and so their request for a stay pending judicial review (see 1705110042) shouldn’t be granted, said Sinclair and NAB opposition filings Wednesday in docket 13-236. Courts tend to defer to expert agencies, and the FCC’s “determination that the UHF Discount is inextricably intertwined with the national audience reach cap is rational and fully consistent with the governing statute,” said Sinclair. NAB was critical of the logic behind the challenge, saying petitioners don’t address the FCC argument that the agency never had the authority to initially get rid of the UHF discount. The groups’ argument is “on such feeble ground that they even resort to claiming the UHF discount -- which is used to define audience reach -- is not ‘intrinsically linked’ to the national TV ownership cap,” NAB said.

The FCC Media Bureau implemented "non-substantive changes" to several forms to reflect 2016 changes to media ownership and foreign ownership rules, said a public notice Wednesday. Affected forms are 301, 303-S, 3114/315, 316, 340, 345, and 349.

Low-power broadcasters in TV designated market areas that can be cleared for wireless use without the need to wait for any primary broadcasters to move may need to be dark for more than the FCC-allowed year, said LPTV Spectrum Rights Coalition Director Mike Gravino in a meeting May 11 with the FCC Incentive Auction Task Force and Media Bureau Video Division staff, recounted a filing in docket 12-268. Gravino called such DMAs "Phase Zero" since wireless carriers likely will occupy that spectrum first. LPTV licensees in phase zero may need special waivers, Gravino said. He said some relocation-eligible Class A stations may opt to decline reimbursement funds in order to have flexible use rights for their spectrum, and he asked the FCC to take action on mutually exclusive displacement applications remaining from the 2009 displacement window.