SAN FRANCISCO—The leading television stations serving the San Francisco Bay Area have begun offering NextGen TV, aka ATSC 3.0, broadcasts, bringing the new digital broadcast technology to the center of the U.S. tech world.
The launch includes KGO-TV (the ABC-owned ABC affiliate), KPIX-TV (the CBS-owned CBS affiliate), KNTV (the NBCU-owned NBC affiliate), KTVU (the Fox Television Stations-owned Fox affiliate), KDTV-DT (the TelevisaUnivision-owned Univision affiliate), and KRON-TV (the Nexstar-owned MyNet affiliate).
The Bay Area joins a growing list of more than 70 markets where NextGen TV is already available, including such technology hubs as Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Dallas, Denver, Miami, Portland, Raleigh-Durham, Seattle, and Washington D.C.
“Once again, broadcasters have launched ATSC 3.0 while preserving every free over-the-air service and without any disruption to cable and satellite viewers,” said John Hane, president of BitPath. “Stations have far exceeded the FCC’s requirements to protect viewers who rely on older digital TVs, while bringing improved television service to those with new ATSC 3.0 sets. In addition, the advanced digital broadcasting services we’ll be launching on ATSC 3.0 will help keep local broadcasting strong, while providing new, high value services to people, businesses, and public agencies – all without any compromises to television service. And we’ve committed to make our groundbreaking NavPath precise navigation service available for free to all Bay Area first responders. This is a win-win-win for viewers, stations, and the entire Bay Area.”
For the launch, KRON-TV, which is owned by Nexstar, has converted to ATSC 3.0 transmissions. KRON-TV will broadcast its own programming, as well as the programming of the other participating stations, in NextGen TV format. All programming of all participating stations will continue to be available in the existing DTV format, which can be received on all modern television sets. BitPath, which is developing new data broadcasting services, led the planning process and coordinated efforts across the six television stations.
TV Tech has been tracking the launch of NextGen TV market by market since the first stations began deploying ATSC 3.0. Our complete coverage of NextGen TV can be found here; the complete list of the markets where stations have launched 3.0 broadcasts is here.
