Focus: Broadcasting

By Owen D. Kurtin With its changing landscape, The enlargement of the European Union (EU) will have direct implications on future space business conducted both regionally within Europe as well as globally within the commercial and military satellite sectors. On May 1, 2004, the EU grew from 15 to 25 member states. This joining in...

by Peter J. Brown The sun is shining, and Space- ShipOne has just returned safely to earth, touching down in California after its historic suborbital flight. So, it is a great time to be talking about soaring imaginations and down-to-earth business models. As satellite broadband ventures start easing to the launch pad, the time has...

by Michael R. Flynn We have been pondering the growth of Digital Audio Radio Service (DARS) and Direct Broadcast Service (DBS) throughout the last couple of years. Right now, these are the only emerging service success stories of note in the satellite sector. The reasons for their success, however, are not at all intuitive. For...

By James Careless Thomas Paine once wrote, "These are the times that try men’s souls." Although he was referring to the American Revolution, Paine’s comments succinctly sum up the tumultuous state of the satellite newsgathering (SNG) industry. Keeping Up With Technology The SNG market is all about technology. Mounting a portable satellite transmitter and antenna...

Three words seem to sum up the Latin American economy: boom and bust. In the early 1990s, this region was a prime destination for satellite service providers. Then, economic and political chaos struck and the once hot market quickly turned into a financial funeral pyre for international investors. Consider the experience of Microspace Communications Corp.,...

By Peter J. Brown The first generation High Definition Television (HDTV) was all about preparing HD-ready digital infrastructure, while second-generation HDTV is all about filling up the content pipe with programming that counts and pushing the HDTV network to do more for consumers, content producers and service providers. The satellite industry quickly is moving ahead...

By Peter J. Brown The satellite industry continues to stay focused, doing a few things better than its terrestrial counterparts. Some regions enjoy relative stability with respect to both the transponder pool and the pricing of available capacity, while in other parts of the world things are seriously askew with a significant surplus of capacity...

A migration to advanced encoding solutions looms. To what solution and exactly when this might happen are the questions of the moment. Stunning results at lower bit rates have started everyone buzzing, but are things really moving quicker than expected? Are the satellite, cable and TV broadcast sectors aggressively going to embrace these advanced encoding...

by Gerry Oberst What is it about satellite broadcasting that attracts politicians with taxes on their minds? Tax proposals continue to bubble up in both the United States and in Europe with alarming frequency. In the last few months, the industry watched and debated proposed taxes on satellite TV in Utah, Arkansas, Kentucky and Arizona....

By Peter J. Brown Beaming Internet Protocol (IP) video via satellite either live or via the store-and-forward method for both fixed and mobile services is no longer a rare event. While the desktop PC may still be the primary destination for video streaming over IP, the range of destinations for video over IP rapidly is...