Another LPFM station has taken the plunge into the HD Radio space: introducing KVCB-LP, run by the Vacaville (CA) Christian Schools. KVCB is the second LPFM station to be authorized by the FCC to broadcast in HD – the first was WGVV-LP in Rock Island, Illinois, which received FCC authorization for digital broadcasting last decade, though it’s unclear if the station ever deployed it.
KVCB-LP was the brainchild of music teacher and genuine prodigy Ralph Martin, who’s long had the radio-bug: in 1997 he built a network of Part 15 AM transmitters for the students to use, and when the LPFM service was initially authorized in 2000, Martin made all the necessary plans to apply for a license.
Congressional meddling into LPFM – namely, tightening the interference-protection standards on these small stations – meant that Vacaville went from having potential channels available to having none. But Martin bided his time, and when Congress undid many of the restrictions on LPFM earlier this decade and the FCC opened another application-filing window, he was ready. Construction permit in hand, the station went on the air, initially analog-only, in 2014. Continue reading “LPFM + HD Radio = 💰🔥”
Tag: licensing
HD Radio: Sold…Again
It came as a surprise to attendees of last week’s NAB Radio Show in Nashville: just a day before the CEO of DTS, the company who bought HD Radio proprietor iBiquity just last year, was to be a featured guest at a convention luncheon, his company was acquired by Tessera Technologies in an $850 million deal.
Who is Tessera? Founded in New York back in 1990, the company initially began as a designer and manufacturer of semiconductor chipsets, including memory modules. It went public on the NASDAQ stock exchange in 2003; five years later it acquired FotoNation, a company devoted to image analysis. Continue reading “HD Radio: Sold…Again”
iBiquity Lawyers Up to Defend Patents and Business Model
It’s been a busy year for iBiquity Digital Corporation in court, as it fends off attacks on its HD Radio patents and licensing structure. In both cases, iBiquity seems to have dodged a few bullets and may even have the upper hand. However, they also illustrate the tenuous nature of HD’s adoptive trajectory. Continue reading “iBiquity Lawyers Up to Defend Patents and Business Model”
HD Radio: Pay to Play
Ibiquity Digital Corp., patent-holders on the In-Band On-Channel (IBOC) digital audio broadcast standard adopted by the U.S., announced its license fee structure earlier this month. Ibiquity’s technology is proprietary – therefore, going forward, digital radio broadcasting requires two licenses to broadcast: one from the government and one from Ibiquity.
In hopes of enticing early adoption, the initial “one-time” general IBOC license fee to Ibiquity begins at $5,000 per station. If stations wait just three years to convert, however, they will find that fee to be five-fold.
Then, there are the residuals: stations that multicast (i.e. carry multiple program streams on one channel) must pay Ibiquity 3% of the revenues derived from the second DAB channel, or $1,000, whichever is greater. This fee will be assessed annually. This is somewhat ironic because National Public Radio led the effort to develop IBOC-compliant multicast capability (something commercial broadcasters initially rebuffed). Continue reading “HD Radio: Pay to Play”