Dish teamed with C Spire Wireless to promote Dish’s TV Everywhere products and DVR technologies in C Spire’s retail locations. C Spire is installing demonstration areas to engage customers and present Dish’s technology, Dish said. C Spire customers who subscribe to Dish programming “can watch live TV anywhere, anytime on their smartphones and tablets using the Dish Remote Access app” or by logging on to www.dishonline.com, Dish said.
Q1 sales at CBS gained 12 percent from a year earlier to $3.9 billion, the company said. Licensing agreements with digital distributors along with syndication deals boosted sales. Ad sales also gained 5 percent from a year earlier on the strength of its network primetime and sports lineups, it said. Sales at its local broadcasting group were $622 million, about the same as a year earlier. Profit increased about 80 percent from a year ago on higher operating income, and a one-time gain on the early extinguishment of debt.
Gilat will provide its SkyEdge II network for GSM frequency and 3G cellular backhaul in southeast Asia. Gilat was selected by a Tier-1 Mobile Network Operator, Gilat said. The new network “will provide improved bandwidth efficiency and higher throughputs to the operator’s 2G and 3G networks.” The cellular backhaul solution offers customized features “designed to maximize bandwidth efficiency while enabling enhanced voice quality and high-speed data throughput,” Gilat said.
The Senate Commerce Committee plans a hearing with the FCC commissioners on May 16, said a Capitol Hill aide. The aide said Tuesday that the committee plans to invite FCC nominees Ajit Pai and Jessica Rosenworcel if they are confirmed by the Senate next week. The committee hasn’t formally made an announcement and would not confirm the timing or location of the hearing. The Senate committee has not held a full-scale oversight hearing on the FCC since Julius Genachowski became chairman.
Cable operators are increasingly marketing standalone broadband service, Credit Suisse analyst Stefan Anninger wrote investors. In recent years, cable companies charged a premium to customers who did not buy broadband in a bundle with other products, he said. But “over the last 18 months, two elements of cable’s HSD [high speed data] pricing have changed,” he said. Cable operators are offering their flagship broadband tiers at promotional prices of $30 a month for six to 12 months, and when the promotions end, the price customers ultimately pay is the same as customers who buy it in a bundle, he said: “For years” multiple system operators (MSOs) “resisted offering standalone HSD at an attractive price for fear of discouraging bundling and putting its video business at risk.” With about 65 percent of the industry’s video subscribers already buying broadband, subscriber growth has been harder to achieve, Anninger said. “Cable’s new HSD pricing strategy signals an important identity shift: namely the industry’s growing cognizance that MSOs are increasingly HSD providers that offer video vs. video providers that happen to offer HSD."
Total broadcast TV ad sales fell about 7.8 percent in 2011 from a year earlier to $17.9 billion, BIA/Kelsey said. It attributed the drop to the economy and lack of political ad sales. Stations brought in another $535 million in online ad sales, up 19 percent from 2010, it said. With an influx of political ads expected this year, the industry researcher projected TV station revenue, including online sales, to reach $20.3 billion. “Local television stations are establishing increased expertise in packaging, pricing and selling cross-platform and multi-device ad-supported content services,” said Managing Director Rick Ducey. “We anticipate greater utilization of smartphones and tablets for engaged audience experiences with local streaming video content."
CEA President Gary Shapiro told his counterpart at NAB not to discourage broadcaster participation in the voluntary incentive auction the FCC wants to hold for TV station spectrum. Gordon Smith’s speech last month at the NAB Show (CD April 20 p4) “appeared to be rather discouraging of broadcaster participation,” Shapiro wrote him in a Monday letter the CEA released Tuesday. “Recent statements discouraging participation in and support of these auctions are not only inconsistent with the goals of Congress, but also are not helpful to competition necessary for a successful and competitive auction,” Shapiro wrote. “Broadcasters do not legally own the spectrum at issue and have been assigned limited duration licenses. Congress was extraordinarily generous in allowing broadcasters to be compensated for these limited duration licenses should they choose to offer them for auction.” NAB supported the voluntary incentive auction legislation passed by Congress and “looks forward to working with the FCC and Congress to implement the bill,” a spokesman responded. “Just like radio and TV, spectrum licenses of broadband providers like Verizon and AT&T are also of limited duration and subject to renewal."
The Senate Commerce Committee plans to hold a hearing on data privacy May 9, said spokespeople for the FTC and Senate Communications Subcommittee Chairman John Kerry, D-Mass. The committee has asked FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz, Department of Commerce General Counsel Cameron Kerry and possibly one other witness to testify at the hearing. The timing and location of the hearing have not yet been confirmed, and the committee plans to make a formal announcement to finalize details of the hearing later this week, a committee spokesman said.
Campaign Media Analytics Group President Ken Goldstein and Vice President Elizabeth Wilner expect more political ad sales in 2012 than in previous elections, they told investors Monday, according to a note from Wells Fargo analyst Marci Ryvicker, who hosted a teleconference with them. But it does not sound like any incremental spending will come from broadcast TV, Ryvicker wrote. “The biggest upside surprise could be in political ad spend on the internet,” she said.
Scripps Networks Interactive said it completed its purchase of Travel Channel International.