TV/Cable News

The automotive brands are back, after a post-holiday hiatus. And, they've returned in a big way, with four big brands once again present in the latest Media Monitors Spot Ten TV report. Which brand was the most active? You're one click away from the answer.

In mid-October of last year, Sinclair Broadcast Group moved a critical operation to a fully virtualized public environment, enabling the company to realize a variety of cost and business advantages. What did it do? It streamlined and customized the distribution of the broadcast media company's children's programming by centralizing playout operations in the public cloud.

Georgia-based Gray Television, Inc. announced Friday that its television stations set new ratings records during the November 2017 sweeps period conducted by the Nielsen Company. Gray’s more than 100 television stations in 57 markets collectively broadcast over 200 program streams, including 103 Big Four network program streams.

Sports-first streaming TV service fuboTV and video ad serving platform SpotX have announced a strategic partnership. According to the deal, SpotX will power the programmatic monetization of fuboTV’s live, over-the-top content - including more channels that carry sports in a base package than any similar service.

The 2018 Great Lakes Media Show will take place March 6 and 7 at the Lansing Center in downtown Lansing, Michigan. This year, broadcast industry veteran Martyn Horspool will break down ATSC 3.0. Horspool currently serves as the product manager for television transmission at GatesAir in Mason, Ohio.

BIA/Kelsey has released the numbers for radio and TV deals in 2017. It may not have been a banner year, but it was strong nonetheless. There are, however, indicators that may augur well for 2018.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Shari Redstone — vice-chairwoman of both CBS Corp. and Viacom — is seeking to shake up the CBS board and once again consider a reunification of the two entities controlled by Redstone through National Amusements. This, predictably, resulted in a big gain on Wall Street for Viacom's Class B shares and for CBS stock in Thursday's trading.

What is ATSC 3.0? What does it mean for the consumer, and the broadcaster? Simply put, the next-gen broadcast TV standard has the power to "drive a broadcast revenue renaissance," and that was just one of the focal points in a NATPE Miami panel discussion held Wednesday afternoon featuring several key TV executives involved in the rollout of what could be a game changer for UHF and VHF stations across the U.S.

Three large broadcast TV station ownership groups have reached an agreement with American Tower Corp. to jointly construct and operate Single Frequency Network (SFN) sites to broadcast next-gen TV signals with the Dallas-Fort Worth market. It's the first step toward a national launch of ATSC 3.0, and involves Sinclair Broadcast Group, Nexstar Media Group and Univision. 

Univision Communications just got a little cozier to key program supplier Grupo Televisa. Miami-based Univision and Mexico City-based Televisa revealed here at NATPE Miami that they've teamed to launch a first-ever TV pilot initiative designed "to nurture the development of new original scripted and unscripted series by global independent producers."

When it comes to the buying and selling of media properties, there is perhaps no bigger marketplace -- and discussion locale -- than the annual NAB Show in Las Vegas. That said, NATPE Miami is now a "must" for one big media brokerage. Why? RBR+TVBR spoke with two of their brokers for the full story on why Kalil & Co.'s presence at this global TV industry gathering is an essential task.

The prolific wordsmith of Wall Street, Pivotal Research's Brian Wieser, has just completed an analysis of trends associated with the use of TV alongside advertising share trends for national media owners in the U.S. through the end of December. The report comes with the release Tuesday by Nielsen of complete calendar-month ratings data. The bottom line from Wieser? Total use of TV was down again.

As RBR+TVBR was first to report on Nov. 30, 2017, HC2 is acquiring the Azteca América Spanish-language broadcast network from affiliates of Mexico’s TV Azteca. HC2 also signed a definitive acquisition agreement to acquire the broadcast TV assets of Northstar Media LLC. Northstar owns a collection of low-power TV stations that comprise the largest Azteca América affiliate group in the U.S. Among those stations is Class A KPDF-41 in Phoenix. Now, HC2 will have a bigger facility serving the Valley of the Sun.

With the success of new content services, distributors and hardware platforms, OTT has become an important platform that enables broadcasters and advertisers on a local and national level to extend the research of their content and capture incremental audience. What does this mean for broadcast TV station owners? All of these developments are positive, a NATPE Miami panel featuring Nielsen executives reveals.

A lot more TV viewers across the U.S. will soon be able to enjoy a "Daily Blast," and a whole array of first-run programming from one of the nation's biggest owners of broadcast TV stations.