Broadcasters Brace For Another C-Band Squeeze
The first “C-band repack,” triggered by an FCC Report & Order in February 2020 and completed in summer 2023, cleared the C-band from 3.7 to 4 GHz and squeezed broadcasters’ distribution into the remaining 200 MHz from 4 to 4.2 GHz. It was accomplished by the launch of new satellites and the implementation of advanced encoding and modulation technology, which allowed them to deliver far more program services per transponder than they had supported previously.
Now, as per the “One Big Beautiful Bill” passed by Congress last year, the FCC is due to auction by July 4, 2027, at least 100 MHz of upper C-band spectrum — and perhaps as much as 180 MHz — to wireless operators for 5G and 6G services. In releasing a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) last November, the FCC indicated that it planned to “leverage its highly successful framework from the first C-band proceeding,” with a similar 5.5-year timeline, reimbursement to incumbent C-band users for necessary relocation costs and incentive payments to satellite operators for clearing the spectrum early.
Comments on the process from various stakeholders, including broadcast networks and affiliates, trade associations, satellite and wireless operators and technology vendors, have poured into the FCC over the past year. Final FCC rules in the form of an official Report & Order are expected by this summer, which is also when the bidding process for new wireless licenses in the C-band was originally slated to start.
The stakes are high. The first C-band auction, completed in early 2021, reaped $81.17 billion from wireless carriers including Verizon and AT&T. Part of that windfall went to pay $3 billion in relocation costs to cover expenses incurred by programmers and incumbent earth station operators like broadcast affiliates and cable headends. That included the purchase of new encoders and integrated receiver/decoders (IRDs), as well as the installation of special filters at C-band earth stations designed to eliminate interference from 5G signals on the ground as well as from airplanes’ radar equipment above.
The auction also funded $9.3 billion in “accelerated relocation payments” to satellite operators like SES and Intelsat (the two companies have since merged) for beating initial deadlines in vacating the spectrum. Those acceleration payments are widely credited as the reason for completing the spectrum-clearing process over two years before its initial deadline of December 2025.
Broadcasters and vendors both say there are key differences between the first C-band repack and this one. The biggest distinction is that no one expects programmers will be able to maintain their current services by simply relying on C-band frequencies alone, regardless of how much spectrum the FCC ultimately winds up auctioning off.
Even if the auction sticks to a minimum of 100 MHz, say broadcasters and vendors, there simply won’t be enough spectrum to go around to distribute the current load of programming. That means networks are eyeing alternatives like Ku-band satellite and IP terrestrial distribution from vendors like LTN and Zixi, as well as backup paths like 5G wireless and low earth orbit (LEO) satellite. And two or more of those alternative distribution paths will likely need to be combined in a hybrid fashion to replicate the reliability and broad reach that C-band satellite affords today.
“This time around it’s a little different, because there’s not much room to pack everybody in anymore,” says Alan Young, Zixi VP of strategic business development. “Even with 100 megahertz, which is the minimum, there are going to be some people that literally have to move off the band altogether. And this is what is causing quite a lot of concern.”
While Young is currently promoting IP terrestrial delivery as a key alternative, he readily acknowledges the proven reliability of C-band satellite. Over decades of program distribution via C-band, he says, “you can count the times where there’s been any sort of material issue on the fingers of one hand.” But Young also agrees with the FCC’s decision to repurpose more C-band for 5G, as he views it as a much more efficient use of the spectrum overall.
Replicating the reliability of C-band will require using at least two alternative technologies, if not three. Most stations only have one physical duct that brings internet connectivity into the building, says Young, even if they pay for diverse paths with an ISP or use two different ISPs. That is why he advocates using a wireless connection, whether it be Ku-band, 5G or LEO, in combination with terrestrial IP in order to provide physical diversity in case of the dreaded “backhoe fade” when a fiber line is cut from misdirected digging.
Many broadcasters see Ku-band as an appealing option despite its susceptibility to “rain fade,” i.e., losing signal in poor weather. Zixi has worked with satellite technology integrator and monitoring provider USSI Global and signal processing vendor Cobalt Digital to demonstrate Ku-band transmission with an IP backup based on Reliable Internet Stream Transport (RIST). [The specification developed by the Video Services Forum (VSF) is formally referred to as TR-06-4 Part 7, RIST Satellite-Hybrid: In-Band Method.] It first did so at NAB Show New York last fall and then duplicated the system at USSI’s lab in Melbourne, Fla., so customers can see it in action.
“We can use IP as a way of recovering packets that are lost because of rainfall, so essentially making Ku-band as reliable as C-band,” Young says.
The USSI lab shows how placing markers in the transport stream can indicate when packets haven’t been transmitted via Ku-band and IP retrieval is required. It also has demonstrations of how LEO satellite, 5G, enterprise grade fiber, bonded cellular, cable modems, fixed wireless and microwave links can all work together to help replace C-band, to help broadcasters better investigate their options.
“Right now, we’re in this huge phase of discovery,” says Ted Korte, USSI Global VP of engineering and technology.
The other significant difference in the second C-band repack is financial. While the first transition was accomplished largely by capital investment in new hardware, this one is expected to come with significant ongoing operating expenses as broadcasters pay for a potential mix of managed terrestrial IP delivery, occasional-use Ku-band capacity and fill-in transmissions from 5G and LEO links.
The reimbursement for capital expenditures (capex) in the first transition was relatively straightforward, say broadcasters, but reimbursement for operating expense (opex) is expected to be both more complicated and potentially more difficult to get.
“You’ll see in some of the filings that there’s a notion of reimbursement for 10 years of operational expense,” says Ken Fuller, Paramount/CBS VP distribution & technology. “Because if entities are forced to go terrestrial, then that’s a new financial model. Whereas in the satellite world we could capitalize the equipment that was purchased and it was a fixed cost, transitioning to a terrestrial network is an ongoing operational expense that is not part of what we have in our current distribution financials.”
CBS managed the last repack by replacing legacy MPEG-4 encoders In New York and Los Angeles with Evertz HEVC gear that included 16APSK DVB-S2X modulation and rolling out HEVC-capable IRDs to affiliates. The new systems allowed CBS to trim its 1080i feeds to 210 affiliates from 20 Mbps down to 15 Mbps and reduce the total number of C-band transponders it used across two Intelsat (now SES) satellites from five to three. The whole process took about 2.5 years.
CBS not only relies on C-band for its primary program distribution, including standard East and West Coast feeds and a dozen regionalized feeds for NFL games, but also uses it as backup contribution feed to fiber for NFL games and other big live events. In some instances, C-band can still be the primary contribution path if a venue doesn’t have fiber connectivity, in which case CBS typically rolls in two C-band trucks for diversity.
Paramount has moved to CDN-based distribution for some of its cable networks. But CBS still values the “deterministic switching” that C-band satellite provides when the network is delivering live programming to affiliates that all need to cut to their own live programming, like local news, at the exact same time.
“The capabilities of C-band for distribution and contribution are key and is not able to be duplicated with other means of connectivity,” Fuller says. “Yes, you can do Ku-band, and it works just fine, but Ku-band is susceptible to weather, as we know. And then in the terrestrial world, just think of how much equipment is in between an encoder and an affiliate IRD in the satellite world, and how much equipment is in between an encoder and an affiliate IRD in a terrestrial world — multiple PoPs [points of presence], multiple switches, potentially different vendors. It’s not an equivalent kind of thing.”
Fuller says he has to plan for the worst possible scenario where 180 MHz of C-band spectrum is auctioned off and only 20 MHz, or about half a transponder, is left for fixed satellite services (FSS). But he is hopeful that broadcasters will be left with enough capacity to at least stay on C-band for some interim period.
Encoding and conditional access supplier Synamedia, which says it currently handles about 45% of existing C-band channels, expects that the first 100 MHz will be cleared rather quickly, perhaps by the end of 2028. It then predicts a second tranche of C-band spectrum, perhaps up to another 80 MHz, to be cleared by the end of 2030.
Synamedia is currently working with its customers to identify different transition scenarios, which can vary widely depending on how many channels they need to send and the number of locations that need to receive it.
“We see multiple solutions for this,” says Ed Allfrey, Synamedia EVP of video networks. “Some will repack into that small amount of C band that is left using the most efficient codecs. Some may move to Ku band with IP backup. Some will just go pure terrestrial IP distribution over current networks. And some will look for fiber with a secondary backup mechanism, which could be 5G or it could be Starlink, or whatever Low Earth Orbit satellite, to give extra availability over that.”
While big broadcasters like CBS and Fox have already moved to HEVC, a number of networks, particularly smaller cable programmers, are still using MPEG-4 AVC, says Kenelm Dean, Synamedia director of solutions management, distribution. Those networks could leverage an upgrade to HEVC to repack into a smaller slice of C-band. Doing so would include outfitting headends with new IRDs, such as Synamedia’s software-native MEG unit, that can handle HEVC satellite or IP terrestrial feeds. That would prepare those headends for an eventual move completely off C-band to terrestrial IP.
A positive trend for IP terrestrial distribution is that costs are going down, Allfrey says. The biggest current question is whether it can reach every affiliate that a network needs to reach.
“We’re really convinced that where connectivity is available those costs are under control,” Allfrey says. “It’s really about whether they can get the availability figures that they’re confident with. That would be about diversely routed IP connectivity, or about a separate network backup.”
Fox currently relies on Zixi to deliver programming via terrestrial IP to digital MVPDs like Hulu, YouTube TV and Amazon Prime Video. It also uses LTN’s managed IP network and has experimented with Eluvio’s “Content Fabric” to deliver VOD content. But all of its network programming is still delivered via C-band to local stations and cable headends, using HEVC encoders and IRDs purchased during the last C-band repack.
With the continued government pressure on satellite spectrum and the rapid growth of its digital businesses, Fox’s eventual goal is to move completely to IP terrestrial distribution. But that will be a long process, given the varying levels of connectivity across affiliate stations and cable headends.
“We’re trying to balance subscriber and affiliate reliability with a level of pragmatic cost and risk management,” says Jeff Dow, Fox Corp. EVP of media and platform technology. “There are technical solutions that will work, but it’s the coordination of the systems and the suppliers. And there’s always a challenge in the last mile.”
Fox enjoys direct Lumen fiber connections to its 18 owned stations, which it could use to deliver network programming. But it relies strictly on C-band satellite to reach its 191 non-owned affiliates, as well as for delivery of Fox News Channel and other cable networks to headends.
To inform Fox’s decisions on various options including C-band, Ku-band and SRT, Alistair Hamilton, Fox SVP of distribution engineering and architecture, has begun the process of cataloging the different capabilities at the affiliates, including existing IP connectivity, the presence or lack of diverse paths and additional available options like 5G.
“It’s a very detailed catalog per market, per station,” Dow says. “What are the capabilities, what are the bandwidths, what are the providers?
“When we separate that out it gives us, what are the solutions for each of those markets—we’re going to have to keep C-band, or is Ku-band good enough? SRT? Or we’re going to go into this knowing that we may be single legged to some of these markets.”
Fox’s near-term plan is to stay on C-band where it needs to and shift to terrestrial IP where it makes sense, such as big-market stations with robust internet connections, while still maintaining diverse paths. It plans to start POCs of terrestrial IP in three big markets after this summer’s FIFA World Cup concludes.
The next phase will be to use Ku-band to reach those affiliates where full-time IP doesn’t make sense but also maintain an IP backup. NBC is the lone network today that uses Ku-band on a full-time basis for program distribution, though it also maintains a C-band backup.
Moving to Ku-band will require swapping out feedhorns on existing dual C-band antennas that Fox controls at 209 local stations, a relatively straightforward process Hamilton says could be completed in nine months. On the cable side, such work would be up to the operators, since they own the receive dishes at headends.
An interesting wrinkle is that Fox might not be using Ku-band capacity for program distribution all of the time but instead will likely be buying it on an ad-hoc basis as needed, such as during an NFL broadcast.
Part of what makes Ku-band delivery feasible long-term is frequency “cross-strapping” technology that allows a satellite to receive a C-band uplink and then send it down as a Ku-feed. Hamilton says that SES will be launching several new satellites with cross-strapping capability.
“We’ll continue to uplink at C-band, downlink at Ku-band, which is big for us because I don’t have to modify our earth station complexes,” Hamilton says. “That would be very time-consuming and expensive.”
Even with that time savings, Hamilton still expects the whole transition, including satellite builds and launches, to take five years from the very start of the process.
LTN has created an “overlay” network designed for managed video delivery on the public internet by placing its intelligent routing hardware in data centers across the globe that connect to various Tier-1 carriers. The company has handled distribution of Sinclair’s diginets to affiliates for years and enjoys a steadily growing business in delivering live sports to virtual MVPDs. In the past two years LTN has already successfully moved several major networks from C-band distribution to terrestrial IP, including TelevisaUnivision, MSG Network and Tennis Channel.
Despite the company’s track record in satellite replacement, LTN Executive Chairman and Co-Founder Malik Khan says he understands why broadcasters are hesitant to jump full-bore into IP distribution and are instead exploring a mix of hybrid delivery architectures including Ku-band. And from a business perspective, he also understands why a satellite operator like SES would tell the FCC that it will need five years to launch new Ku-band-capable satellites to support television delivery if the FCC winds up auctioning more than 100 MHz of C-band spectrum.
But that doesn’t mean it makes sense to him, Khan says.
“And then at the end of all of that, billions of dollars of reimbursable income, you have a technology that’s not as good as C-band, that is subject to rain fade, provides no future path to digital domains, and is forcing everybody to say, ‘If I get Ku I need a backup, right?’” he says. “I mean, how stupid is this, honestly?”
What makes sense to Khan is for broadcasters to simply start moving to IP terrestrial distribution, whether it is with LTN or another vendor like Zixi or via self-managed SRT delivery, at least by doing some POCs. He says LTN’s terrestrial IP service is 40 to 60% cheaper than C-band satellite and has already been proven to work, that reliability concerns are overblown, and that IP capabilities can only improve with time.
“The only way really that makes any sense is to start migrating,” Khan says. “You going to need IP regardless, regardless of whether it is primary, whether it’s secondary, whether it’s the only option. There is no world in which you don’t have IP. The discussions we’re having with people is to get started.”
With all the focus on large programmers’ challenges with the C-band repack, Khan adds, the industry tends to forget about the impact the transition will have on cable operators, particularly small to mid-size headends. Through its customer relationships LTN already has placed its IP gateway receiver systems in the majority of MVPDs. The company’s goal is to reach 100% coverage of the cable and telco operator universe before any existing C-band services are disrupted.
LTN has struck partnerships with encoder manufacturers like Mediakind to support delivery of content to their IRDs through its network. It has also pitched the FCC on covering the cost of placing its gateways, which run $20,000 and can handle 500 channels each, at headends as part of the second C-band transition (a $10,000 unit, often provided as a companion, will handle 100 channels). While programmers pay for delivery over the LTN network, operators have traditionally borne the cost of the gateways.
“One of the things we’re saying to the FCC is help us to help the rural guys by putting an aggregation point in there, a media gateway that allows you to take IP regardless of the origin technology,” Khan says. “That could be SRT, it could be Zixi, it could be LTN, it could be anything. Have a gateway that terminates everything into the operator’s infrastructure, and don’t touch anything QAM. Let them run their existing QAM equipment and get that experience in now.”
As one of the country’s largest station groups, Sinclair will be impacted by whatever moves the Big 4 networks make in response to the C-band auction, whether that is a shift to Ku-band downlinks or further migration to IP delivery (Sinclair is already using the public cloud to playout the majority of its stations today, under the control of Zixi Zenmaster orchestration software and Amagi playout tools).
As the owner of Tennis Channel, Sinclair has already successfully adopted full IP distribution, completing a transition to the LTN network last October while keeping the cable network’s existing Synamedia encoders and decoders. Paul Spinelli, AVP, Sinclair Broadcast Group engineering, says it was a minor struggle to get LTN installed at some smaller MVPDs with skeleton IT staffs but that it overcame those issues with some help from LTN. It is currently delivering a 10 Mbps HEVC feed through LTN and the pictures look great, he adds.
Broadcasters’ approach to transmission redundancy is “determined by your revenue pie,” Spinelli says. Tennis Channel has two primary ISPs and two backups, which connect to its Santa Monica, Calif., headquarters through diverse service entrances. All four of those lP links feed into the LTN network. In the six months since making the switch, the only problem Tennis Channel has encountered was a self-generated one due to an encoder.
“For Tennis Channel to go down off the LTN network, I have to lose four carriers through two different pipes,” Spinelli says.
That level of redundancy is more than adequate for Tennis Channel, he says, but it wouldn’t be if he was broadcasting the Super Bowl. In that case IP might still be primary but he would want at least one if not two wireless backups, such as bonded 5G or LEO connections. It is those kind of reliability concerns that will check the speed of the industry’s shift to full IP terrestrial delivery, particularly when it comes to the big networks.
“My personal opinion is that the C-band is not really going to go away-away,” Spinelli says. “We’re going to have an auction, but there’s still going to be some of it left. And I think what you’re going to find is most of the networks will have a carrier up. They won’t call it ‘primary’ and ‘backup’ anymore. They’ll just call it ‘the carrier,’ and then they’ll have an IP solution. And over time, the IP solution will become the primary, the satellite will become the backup. And then whenever the government comes after the rest of C-band in five, six years and we do this again, those solutions will be mature.”
Go deeper in the C-band conversation at TVNewsCheck’s Programming Everywhere conference on April 19 at the NAB Show with the session “LTN and Tennis Channel on Navigating the IP Transition and Driving Reach and Revenue.” The discussion will look at how fast-evolving FCC regulatory changes happening right now have major consequences for content distribution in the U.S. LTN and Tennis Channel will share best practices and practical guidance on how media companies can navigate this regulatory shift and ensure they are ready to transition to a reliable satellite distribution alternative seamlessly and drive measurable business value by unlocking new revenue opportunities across traditional broadcast and digital platforms. Register here.
The post Broadcasters Brace For Another C-Band Squeeze appeared first on TV News Check.
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