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Friday, June 30 marks the end of the fiscal year for many companies across the U.S.
It also marks the start of a historic holiday weekend — the 150th anniversary of Canada —as well as the unofficial start of the Fourth of July celebrations seen throughout the 50 states and its territories.
But, June 30 could also prove to be a very busy day for radio industry engineers and tech gurus—especially those at what some may be secretly calling “The Procrastination Station.” That’s when the AMC-8 satellite says its last goodbye. Some stations still may not be ready for its long-planned demise.
Thanks in large part to coverage in the trade press seen in the last six weeks, there’s been a surge in migration to the replacement satellite for AMC-8 — AMC-18.
Word first surfaced for the majority of radio industry professionals in November 2016, with Skyview Networks among the many satellite radio program providers spreading the word about what will happen on June 30.
Simply put, AMC-8, at 139 degrees West Longitude, has exceeded its design life and is not being replaced by an equivalent C-band satellite at the same location.
That satellite is AMC-18, at 105 degrees West Longitude. Yet, that satellite will also soon reach the end of its lifespan, and will be replaced at the 105 position by the new SES-11.
The key to understanding the importance of satellite migration comes down to sky position: There will be no satellite at 139 degrees West Longitude after Friday.
As of May 12, the transition to AMC-18 was troublesome.
“I’m at 43% today,” said David Dickson, VP/Engineering for Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Skyview.
By May 31, little improvement in the migration percentage was seen among satellite radio programming suppliers.
“We are still at less than 50% compliance, so there is a long way to go,” warned Jana Polsky, Director of Communications at Westwood One. “We too are under 50%,” said a Learfield representative. “It’s kind of typical in radio that nobody does anything until the last week.”
That said, Westwood One is very happy with the progress it has made in the last three weeks. “We are over 80% with compliance,” a company spokesperson tells RBR+TVBR. “Our stations were 45% compliant at the end of May, so we’re really pleased. Hopefully, we will not have people scrambling at the last minute. We still have a way to go. There are stations that still need to make the migration.”
For WW1, there is 78.7% migration for stations on the XDS Satellite Distribution platform; some 84% migration for stations using Wegener distribution has been seen as of Tuesday (6/27).
The rate of migration is even better at Skyview, VP/Engineering Dave Dickson tells RBR+TVBR. “As of this morning, 86% of our affiliates have switched over to the new satellite. At Skyview the transition is definitely headed in the right direction. We have affiliates calling daily to make the transition.”
The end of AMC-8 also impacts stations receiving programming from Orbital Media Networks and Premiere Networks.
Premiere, owned by iHeartMedia, is experiencing similar compliance rates to Skyview, with nearly 90% of affiliates having migrated to AMC-18. A company spokesperson tells RBR+TVBR, “We’re happy with the progress as we near the deadline, but we continue to work diligently with stations to assist with any last-minute transitions as the final migration date is June 30.
Even with the progress seen during the last several weeks, more than 10% of Skyview, Premiere and WW1 affiliates are still using AMC-8.
The goal, therefore, remains 100% compliance come Friday.
For further details on the AMC-8 migration, please visit www.amc8migration.com.
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