Global shipments of handsets fell year-over-year for a second consecutive quarter in Q2, said a report from ABI Research. “Handset shipments have not seen a sequential YoY decline since the global economic crisis of 2008-2009,” analyst Michael Morgan said in a news release. Apple handset shipments declined 26 percent over Q1, primarily because its customers are waiting to purchase the new iPhone, the report said. Nokia and RIM’s handset shipments also had double-digit declines quarter-over quarter, the report said. Samsung had a 13 percent decline in feature phone shipments, but a 16 percent increase in smartphone shipments. “It is becoming increasingly apparent that Samsung, not Apple, will be the OEM who will bring mobile computing to the masses over the near to mid-term,” said ABI senior practice director Jeff Orr (http://xrl.us/bniewi).
The FCC shouldn’t force Time Warner Cable to carry Smith Media’s KEY-TV Santa Barbara, Calif., on its cable systems in Ojai, Oxnard, Santa Paula and Ventura, the cable operator said in an answer and opposition to the broadcaster’s must-carry complaint (http://xrl.us/bnieua). “Smith is not entitled to invoke must-carry rights on behalf of KEYT because the station elected retransmission consent for the current election cycle in November 2010.” The operator already carries the station’s standard-definition signal and is in discussions with the broadcaster to extend that deal and provide for carriage of its HD signal, Time Warner Cable said. “Smith’s complaint is little more than an attempt to and-run those negotiations and secure HD carriage by regulatory fiat."
Gray TV asked the FCC to force Fields Cable in Combs, Ky., to stop carrying or pay for the signal of its WKYT-TV Lexington (http://xrl.us/bniesk). “For several months Fields refused to negotiate for retransmission consent,” Gray said in an enforcement complaint. “Indeed, it even went so far as to refuse to accept delivery of Gray’s statutorily required retransmission consent election notices ... forcing Gray to ask the local sheriff to hand deliver the notices to Fields.” An executive with Fields didn’t immediately respond to our query.
Double-digit growth in wireless will drive the global semiconductor market in 2012, said an IHS iSuppli report released Friday. It forecast overall chip revenue to rise 3 percent to $320.8 billion. Wireless leads, with revenue in that category set to rise 10.4 percent to $72.6 billion; industrial electronics will also be a major contributor, with revenue forecast to rise 7.7 percent, IHS said. Revenue in other semiconductor segments will rise by less than 3 percent or will fall from last year, the report said. “While most markets are struggling with slow growth or declines in 2012, the wireless segment continues to expand at a healthy pace, driven by strong sales gains for smartphones and media tablets,” said Len Jelinek, chief analyst for semiconductor manufacturing at IHS (http://xrl.us/bnietf).
Beasley Broadcast Group Q2 sales fell 2.8 percent from a year earlier to $24.8 million, while profit increased 37 percent to $3.9 million, it said. The lower sales reflected “overall industry weakness” during the first months of the quarter as well as tough comparisons at its Ft. Myers, Fla., stations, said CEO George Beasley. The company plans to keep bolstering its balance sheet, he said. “We ended the second quarter with our lowest leverage ratio in over ten years and remain committed to using cash from operations to further lower debt and other initiatives which can enhance shareholder value.” Beasley Broadcast stock rose 5 percent Friday.
Crown Media Q2 sales increased 14 percent from a year earlier to $86.7 million, the company said. Higher ad sales at its Hallmark Movie Channel helped results, it said. Profit fell 38 percent to $13.5 million on higher income tax provisions. Crown Media stock rose 9.3 percent Friday.
Brightcove said it agreed to buy Zencoder, a cloud-based video encoding service. Terms weren’t disclosed.
The FCC should reject arguments made by AT&T against a proposal by Wilson Electronics, Verizon Wireless and other carriers for cell-booster rules, Wilson representatives said in a meeting with Wireless Bureau Chief Ruth Milkman and other FCC officials. “We reported that AT&T has endorsed nearly all of the operational requirements, interference safeguards, and technical standards” proposed June 8 by Wilson, Verizon, Nextivity, T-Mobile and V-COMM, Wilson said in an ex parte filing (http://xrl.us/bnieqg). AT&T subsequently told the FCC (CD July 5 p11) that Section 301 of the Communications Act “prevents the Commission from authorizing the use of third-party, consumer signal boosters on CMRS carriers’ exclusive-use spectrum without a license or licensee consent,” an argument Wilson said it countered during the meeting. “Empowering carriers to prevent consumers from using such signal boosters would defeat the purposes of establishing a safe harbor for consumer signal boosters; be wholly inconsistent with the Commission’s goal of broadening the use of properly-designed signal boosters to enhance wireless coverage for consumers; invite anti-competitive conduct by carriers; and threaten the growing market for consumer signal boosters,” Wilson said.
The overall number of consumer inquiries to the FCC decreased in Q2 2012 by nearly 21 percent from the previous quarter, from nearly 18,000 to just over 14,000, while the number of informal complaints was down about 2 percent from 89,210 to 87,883 from the quarter before, the FCC announced Friday (http://xrl.us/bniepm). The largest number of inquiries about cable and satellite services was related to billing and rates, making up more than 38 percent of the inquiries during the second quarter. Radio and TV broadcasting inquiries were down due to a decrease in questions about programming issues. Complaints were down everywhere except in wireline telecom, which saw an 11 percent increase from 36,000 to 40,000. Most of the complaints regarded the Do Not Call List, unsolicited faxes, and telemarketing.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit denied the NAB’s motion for a stay of the FCC’s online political file rules. The court said NAB failed to satisfy the stringent requirements for a stay pending court review. “We are pleased, but not surprised, that the court cleared the way for the online public file rules to take effect on August 2,” said Corie Wright, senior policy counsel for Free Press, which was an intervenor in the case with the Benton Foundation, Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, New America Foundation and the Office of Communication of the United Church of Christ. “The NAB’s case for delay was incredibly weak, as today’s decision confirmed,” she said. A spokesman for the FCC declined to comment. The NAB is disappointed by the decision, a spokesman said: “Even though the NAB’s stay request was rejected, NAB’s court challenge to this new rule will continue and be debated on the merits. We continue to believe it is fundamentally unfair to local TV stations to be the only medium required to disclose on the Internet sensitive advertising rate information.” The FCC will demonstrate the new online public file interface at http://xrl.us/bnietj on Monday at 9 a.m. and Tuesday at 4 p.m., it said.