48 Executive Summary Taking the pulse The right
theibcdaily
vibrant to a
platform
Simon Fell Director of Technology & Innovation, EBU
Region: Europe Interviewed by: George Jarrett
Simon Fell became Director of Technology & Innovation at the EBU in September 2013. After a tough baptism, three things stuck in his mind.
“One is the time it takes to get things done at the ITU,” he says. “Then there is the importance of spectrum to terrestrial broadcasters: that’s been uppermost on the agenda both before and after the Lamy report. Third is the sheer willingness of broadcasters across the EBU membership to work together.”
Prior to joining the EBU, Fell was chairman of the technical council at the Digital Television Group, and across his 35-year career he has held key technical roles at C4, ITV, Carlton TV, and in post production. Add his three years on the EBU technical committee, and he was the perfect campaigner to represent broadcasters (along with Jonathan Thompson and Lars
Bucklund) in IBC’s Spectrum Debate.
Have they been fighting a losing battle against the mobile broadband gang? “We put up a very strong defence and won the day in an audience vote,” says Fell.
The decision on 700 MHz was taken out of broadcast hands at the last World Radio Conference, but the Lamy Report gave temporary hope for a stay to 2022 at 700 MHz and hold over the lower spectrum levels until 2030.
“Looks like we start again, but the RSPG and CEBT will soon publish reports on the long term use of the UHF band. As of the end of 2015 countries will choose whether they want to give their entire spectrum in 700 to mobile, to broadcast, or find some way they can co-operate,” says Fell.
“But the nature of the game is that once you get spectrum for both uses (co-primary) then the
mobile spectrum plan tends to be the one that gets deployed, as with 800 MHz.” Will no room be left for PMSE
and broadcasting? “If that is going to be
inevitable, the right time has to be given for it to happen because changing over is difficult. Compensation needs to be considered for those costs broadcasters will incur by having to re-engineer networks,” he adds.
“What’s in 500 MHz and 600 MHz should remain for broadcast for the foreseeable future. Broadcasters won’t consider any major changes to what they have in 500/600 MHz until 2030,” says Fell. “In terms of 700 MHZ we need to find dates that suit individual countries. These dates can be as early as 2017 in places like Finland, where they have decided, all the way out to 2025 and beyond for some countries where heavy use is made of 700 MHz.
“The mobile industry talks about more mobile broadband and rural areas being covered – well, there is no evidence of that so far in what they’ve done on 800 MHz. Then there is the famous convergence argument – talk of using mobile services from low power/low tower and then broadcasting from high power/ high tower, and changing the use by time of day. That is just impractical,” he adds.
“They have got about 3000 MHz of spectrum, but what extra could they do in broadcaster spectrum that is so outstanding that they could not do in their own spectrum already?
Safeguarding everything below 700MHz would enable public service broadcasters and the European AV industry to continue reaching all sectors of the population and sustain broader content choice,” he concludes.
“Broadcasters have got every right to exist and have a vibrant platform, just as much as mobile broadband does”
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