NAB 2012: TV leaders launch Future of Broadcast Television Initiative

Executives from 13 of the leading TV companies have come together to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to officially form the global Future of Broadcast Television (FOBTV) Initiative, atsc.com reports.

The signatories of the FOBTV—Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC), Canadian Broadcast Corporation (CBC), Communications Research Centre Canada (CRC), Digital Video Broadcasting Project (DVB), European Broadcast Union (EBU), Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), Globo TV-Brazil, IEEE Broadcast Technology Society (IEEE-BTS), National Association of Broadcasters (NAB), National Engineering Research Center of Digital TV of China (NERC-DTV), NHK Science and Technology Research Laboratories (NHK), Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and the BrazilianSociety of Television Engineers (SET)—believe that terrestrial broadcasting is uniquely important wireless, infinitely, local, timely and flexible with support free-to-air and subscription services.

The goals of the FOBTV Initiative include the ability to develop future ecosystem models for terrestrial broadcasting taking into account business, regulatory and technical environments; developing requirements for next generation terrestrial broadcast systems; fostering collaboration of digital TV development laboratories, recommending major technologies to be used as the basis for new standards, and requesting standardisation of selected technologies (layers) by appropriate standards development organisations.