Industry News

It is designed “to elevate the visibility of diverse-owned media companies with advertisers and agencies.”

Introducing the Diverse Media Equity program, courtesy of the nation’s dominant audience measurement and consumer psychographics data provider.

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MIAMI — Just days after the closing of a transaction that effectively melds Televisa’s media content and production assets with those of Univision, the combined company now known as TelevisaUnivision Inc. has appointed a pair of sales leaders who are each taking Senior Vice President roles under EVP/Multimedia Sales John Kozack.

Joining the company are Rob McGovern, as SVP of Multimedia Sales, and Richard Bertodatti, as SVP of Multimedia and Audience Sales.

McGovern will be based in Los Angeles and will lead the West Coast National Sales efforts. McGovern was previously SVP/National Sales & Client Partnerships at Outfront Media, where he led West Coast national ad sales and the development of revenue growth strategies to drive new OOH business. McGovern has also served as SVP of Sales & Client Partnerships at WarnerMedia and spent nine years at Discovery Networks as VP/National Sales Manager.

Bertodatti will lead the company’s business with Publicis, IPG, Havas, the Boston territory, and at other agencies and work with Univision’s multimedia sales teams “to help optimize and accelerate the advanced advertising sales capabilities.”

Bertodatti joins TelevisaUnivision from Facebook, where he was Director of Global Investment Programs, focused on video and sponsorship opportunities. He previously spent six years at ViacomCBS, where he was active in the data advertising sales and strategy team.

Bertodatti started his career at Telemundo parent NBCU, where he held various sales roles during his 12-year tenure, across various network, digital and cable properties.

In the Public Relations trade, it has become standard practice to release headline-making breaking business news late in the day on a Friday. By doing so, the impact will be lessened, while consumers affected by the now-resolved dispute are happy and going on with their lives.

This is what occurred just before 6pm Eastern on February 4 between DISH and TEGNA. A new carriage agreement was reached — with its timing expressly tied to the start of the 2022 Winter Olympics.

But, is the second reason for an end to a particularly bitter battle tied to the institutional investment firm led by Soohyung Kim, which is reportedly close to a per-share buyout of the company he unsuccessfully sought to lead via two failed shareholder proposals?

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The year 2021 was a quiet one for U.S. broadcast transactions, according to a new report, and radio station deal values were at their lowest point in at least 40 years.

According to a market deal recap, S&P Global Market Intelligence found that while broadcast station advertising revenue rebounded from the hit it took in 2020 due to the COVID outbreak, the station transaction market is sitting at near-historical lows.

Total TV and radio deal volume for 2021 was $4.72 billion. Radio represented only 4% of that; $190.2 million is the lowest value for radio transactions in the company’s records, spanning four decades.

The four largest radio station deals were driven by three of the country’s top-10 TV station owners.

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In June, Sinclair Broadcast Group announced the sale of its only radio stations to Lotus Communications for $18.06 million.

And late in the year, The Walt Disney Co. received $24.25 million for its remaining radio stations: VCY America will pay $9.25 million for KESN(FM) in the Dallas–Ft. Worth market, while Good Karma Broadcasting will pay $15 million for Disney’s AM stations in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, along with an LMA for Emmis Communications station WEPN(FM).

Of the TV/radio broadcast total, about $4.2 billion or almost 93% came from the top two deals and their spinoffs.

In February 2021, Gray paid $925 million to Quincy Media for two TV stations and two radio stations. In April, Gray then sold 10 full-power and three low-power stations from the Quincy acquisition to Allen Media Group for $380 million. In May, Gray then announced the acquisition of Meredith Corp. and its 16 full-power and 30 low-power TV stations for $2.82 billion.

For the third year in a row, the average cash flow multiple for radio transactions remained stable at 6.6-times forward buyers broadcast cash flow. “In our estimates, only 25 full-power radio stations were sold based on their cash flow. That is, however, five stations more than in 2020.”

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It was expected, yet some remained concerned that the necessary percentage of Radio Music License Committee (RMLC) members needed to approve an agreement was still out of reach.

Those worries can now be swept away. A settlement between the RMLC, a group representing several smaller and independently-owned radio stations, and the Irving Azoff-controlled Global Music Rights (GMR) has been reached.

News of the agreement, which RBR+TVBR learned on Friday was imminent, was first shared by Streamline Publishing’s co-owned Radio Ink early Monday.

The deal puts a settlement of long-running litigation between GMR and the RMLC over the royalties that the radio stations which are members of the Committee, led by Executive Director Bill Velez, will pay for the public performance of music written by composers aligned with GMR.

One condition of the settlement, an important one, called for a sufficient percentage of radio stations to opt into the deal by signing the form license agreement that
RMLC and GMR negotiated. The negotiated form license agreement, with member
stations’ annual license fees, was sent directly by GMR via e-mail. That sufficient percentage of signatures was met.

The new GMR licenses that radio stations represented by the RMLC signed will begin on April 1. An interim license previously agreed upon by the parties expires on March 31.

In a statement, Azoff said, “Global Music Rights stands for songwriters and the value of their music. I am proud of the GMR team for the hard work on behalf of songwriters in achieving this settlement. It is wonderful that GMR and thousands of radio stations coast to coast are partnered to bring great music to fans for many years.”

Speaking for the RMLC is its Chairman, Ed Atsinger III, the Executive Chairman and former CEO of Salem Media Group. Atsinger commented, “This settlement puts an end to more than five years of litigation and represents a shared desire by both sides to find a way for radio stations and GMR to work together on a long-term basis without repeatedly resorting to litigation.”

Litigation was perhaps an unfortunate hallmark of GMR’s battles with RMLC, as the settlement resolves antitrust litigation that dates to late 2016.  The battle was bruising, with RMLC striking first in November 2016. A month later, GMR countersued, assailing the RMLC as “an illegal cartel.”

With the deal, radio stations now have rights and royalty accords with GMR, SESAC, BMI and ASCAP. Despite these payments paid by radio, groups including musicFIRST, led by former New York Congressman Joe Crowley, are aggressively seeking Congressional approval of the American Music Fairness Act. While the AMFA was in the spotlight last week on Capitol Hill, it has far less support than the Local Radio Freedom Act, a resolution that serves as a pledge to vote against any legislation placing new fees on broadcast radio with respect to airplay of recorded music.

Forty-three years ago, he began his career at a Class A FM at 92.7 MHz serving Nassau County, N.Y., and parts of New York City with a mix of rock and punk music that would eventually coalesce under leadership that built a radio station that “Dared to Be Different.”

He later made waves as the man who preceded Howard Stern in overnights at a station that previously featured Jay Thomas in mornings that just couldn’t shake its association with Disco.

For the last 18 years, he’s been running a Class A Adult Alternative FM based in Maryland’s state capital.

Now, Bob Waugh is ready to say farewell.

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Could department store retailers be ramping up their spot TV efforts because of the Olympic Games? Or, are other forces at work?

Whatever the case, Target and Macy’s are highly active users of Spot TV, according to the latest Media Monitors report.

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How many active advertisers are there at Spot Radio these days?

Once one deletes iHeartRadio promotional spots and podcast teasers from the mix, the answer is, sadly, not that many.

On the bright side, Macy’s is back with a new effort. This puts the retailer at No. 10 with some 35,145 spot plays.

By comparison, the top paid advertiser, Indeed, comes in with 62,554 spot plays for the week ending February 6.

At No. 4 thanks to a renewed campaign push is DuckDuckGo, “the Internet privacy company that empowers you to seamlessly take control of your personal information online, without any tradeoffs.”

Meanwhile, ZipRecruiter is present to challenge Indeed in the job search category.

Lastly, the QSR category is represented by Wendy’s.

It’s a company “dedicated to providing Great Local Radio and is committed to being an active and integral part of the communities it serves.”

As of today, meeting that goal is now a bigger part of the role Jim Smith will play at the radio broadcasting company led by Mary Quass.

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The author is a retired broadcast engineer who has been involved with advancing radio and television throughout his career, including for Qualcomm/MediaFLO, Harris, Nautel and ONEMedia LLC/Sinclair.

“I would like to see AM radio begin simulcasting on ATSC 3.0 signals. A single ATSC 3.0 transmitter could carry all of the AM signals in a market, in addition to TV programs.”

That was Dave Hershberger, quoted in a Radio World profile after his much-deserved receipt of the NAB Radio Engineering Achievement Award.

I think his proposition is worth considering.

In my opinion, the ultimate broadcast engineering experience is still an AM directional antenna array. That said, I smile politely when I hear talk of “AM revitalization.” At this point I think a deliberate, clear-eyed look at our much-loved industry leads us to reinvention over repair.

Medium-wave spectrum is far from “beachfront property.” For reasons that have been well documented — poor building penetration, increasing noise, dwindling receivers, aging demographics — the most likely future for AM spectrum is that it will continue to lose value to the point where launching something completely new, like high-power all-digital, makes sense.

The state of deployment of ATSC 3.0 by Nielsen TV market, from the Advanced Television Systems Committee. Areas in orange have at least one station “on the air,” though most have more than one. Those in light blue have stations planning service soon; those in dark blue are coming later in the year, at which point NextGen TV will reach 75% of the viewing public in terms of USA population.

FM’s low-VHF spectrum is closer to “beachfront property,” but even high-VHF is considerably better. Note that originally, FM was promoted as a replacement for AM, it was not promoted as an additional service.

Broadcasters also distribute their linear content via unlicensed and unlimited internet. This is all IP, so there’s no limitation on what can be broadcast, how it is packaged or how much bandwidth it takes.

While OTA broadcast covers unpopulated areas well, streaming is now available in virtually every populated area, building, tunnel, venue, etc., and there are few limits to how big the “coverage area,” can be, up to and including the entire planet.

Besides 5G, tiny IP satellites are coming fast, covering the earth’s surface.

The single most important data point for broadcasters is ascertaining the audience. Our product is “eyes and ears,” a.k.a. “attention,” and we are not alone seeking and selling it.

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When it comes to quantifying and qualifying the audience, OTA falls short of the internet. Interactivity, targeted advertising, non-linear and rich media are all impracticable within the current ecosystem.

That’s not trivial. Radio really can’t compete well with delivery that tells our customers exactly who is listening and can target advertising, alerts and other content.

Radio’s traditional exclusive sweet spot had been mobile. But streaming to smartphones, cars and portable “radios” with the present-day “carrier” access networks, even without 5G, is better in most ways than OTA.

FM chips in phones were never a viable option. But patrons expect that smartphone FM radio will work in any location — basement, elevator, office — where cell phones do but OTA FM cannot reach.

Selling points
So why should radio broadcasters be interested in ATSC 3.0?

First, NextGen Broadcast — and that’s what it is — is not just TV. Because it is IP-based, it can carry anything: linear radio and any data service, album art, or whatever … along with TV.

Second, OFDM on UHF runs circles around AM or FM in terms of coverage and penetration. Critical to this, is that like the HD/OFDM part of HD FM, single-frequency networks composed of multiple transmitters can push coverage into places otherwise unreachable by any other means other than the cellular carriers.

NextGen Broadcast on UHF is beachfront spectrum. No one is lining up to re-farm MW and VHF spectrum. There will be no auctions of radio spectrum.

Moving radio to NextGen Broadcast changes the ground rules.

For my entire career, it has been clear that the Venn diagram of radio and TV has two spheres that are destined to converge. The move to IP does exactly that.

In American radio, broadcasters ordinarily own and operate their own single-service transmitter (HD2, HD3 aside) and maybe some translators and streaming servers. NextGen Broadcast is a multiplex of services, radio, TV and data.

Some NextGen pioneers plan to aggregate their spectrum to move content between transmission systems; adjusting modulation/coding to maximize coverage, reach and capacity as appropriate for the individual services.

ATSC 3.0 can do that. Radio services could have a lease or other arrangement for access to a slice of NextGen multiplexes.

Currently, an FCC license is for 6 MHz of spectrum traditionally held by one entity. In NextGen broadcast, that license typically houses multiple “broadcasters.”

While one might not have to worry about tower lights or transmitter maintenance, “radio stations” likely would not be limited to those with a license and call letters. Regulations probably need to be updated, if for no other reason than rules enforcement reaches the spectrum holder and not the occupants.

There are other regulatory opportunities. For example, being IP, emergency alerting can be done once, collectively, for the whole multiplex.

NextGen has momentum
The current DTV transmission ecosystem is shifting to ATSC 3.0, with the first wave approaching completion with about 75% of the population covered by at least one NextGen Broadcast signal. According to some estimates, 2 million 3.0-capable TV sets will be in homes by Christmas of 2022.

If you think radio has challenges, look at TV. Current DTV is stuck with an ancient inefficient codec that can’t handle what today’s TVs can display and a modulation scheme (8-VSB) that can’t handle motion or support single-frequency network boosters.

It’s hard to imagine that in a decade, OTA TV will still be ATSC 1.0 in any sustainable way. Manufacturers are heavily invested in selling NextGen Broadcast throughout the world because that sells bigger, better TVs. They just have to be contemplating better “radios” too.

So how does that get NextGen Broadcast receiver chips into cars and smartphones?

For that, we have to look at the symbiotic relationship between ATSC 3.0 and 5G.

While most of the world’s connectivity traffic is unicast, the bulky part is broadcast. While the obvious 3.0 use case is the 700-pound gorilla of live linear radio and TV, there is also the anticipated distribution of data for self-driving cars and certainly things yet undreamed.

One can speculate that as the NextGen Broadcast infrastructure expands, discounted distribution and low-cost storage will be attractive for delivering more than the obvious popular movies and podcasts.

When it comes to the intersection of technology, regulation and business, anything can happen anywhere. However, NextGen Broadcast is designed to replace the world’s aging and imperfect OTA distribution. All of it.

This isn’t an incremental improvement.

As NextGen Broadcast transmission is lighting up, what is being distributed is, with few notable early exceptions, simulcasts of existing TV and radio content. That is not a typo. Audio services, including simulcasts of legacy radio stations, are being conveyed by NextGen Broadcast on the air now.

What’s next is the consumer side of the ecosystem. Clearly the first multi-millions of NextGen reception devices will be about simply making pictures and sound.

We radio broadcasters have “asks” that we might not have thought we could dream of. Dynamic (targeted) advertising and listener intelligence will need the devices to run apps that are built in or placed on the device by broadcasters. First-run NextGen TVs do some of that. Radio should be next.

Real opportunity
In a nutshell: After 20-plus years, and millions if not billions of dollars of development by hundreds of entities, NextGen Broadcast is authorized and on the air. Whether incumbent “radio” broadcasters take advantage of its capabilities and opportunities is an individual choice.

Some will stay the course, but others will enter a converged media world that is free of the major impairments and limitations we’ve been “improving” and “revitalizing” our way out of with limited success.

The combination of near-perfect distribution and the unlimited capabilities of OTA IP is a radio content provider’s Holy Grail. It might start with NextGen Broadcast simulcasts, but as a believer in radio, I think it goes much further. While we’ve been running toward revitalization, NextGen Broadcast has just tapped us on the shoulder. This is a tipping point that might take some of us by surprise.

Someday, I’d like to listen to radio in a hotel room again.

Comment on this or any article. Write to radioworld@futurenet.com.

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