Local affiliates of CBS, NBC, PBS and Ion as well as one independent station owned by Fox from the Washington D.C. metro area will announce plans later today to launch the MPH mobile television standard beginning in late summer along with Samsung and LG as hardware partners.
The standard is currently being tested in Raleigh, North Carolina with broadcaster WRAL providing the broadcasts on an ongoing trial basis.
This week during the National Association of Broadcasters trade show, Dell is also expected to demonstrate a laptop with a prototype internal MPH receiver, while audio equipment manufacturer Kenwood is expected to announce future in-car audio/video products based on the standard.
MPH is based on the recently tabled ATSC A/153 standard which specifies requirements for broadcasting over-the-air ATSC signals to mobile devices in contast to the MediaFLO standard which currently requires a compatible cellphone and service plan.
Expansion of the standard and broadcasts is expected by the end of the year in more than 24 cities including New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Boston and Atlanta with an estimated 39% coverage area of US households.
