The best show on mobile TV

The mobile TV market in the United States sure has been interesting to watch.
Three years ago, it was DVB-H vs. MediaFLO. Nokia was backing DVB-H while Qualcomm was developing its own MediaFLO technology. The clashing of technological standards and deep-pocketed combatants harkened back to the good old days of CDMA vs. GSM.
Three years ago many expected MediaFLO to appeal only to CDMA carriers, while DVB-H would be embraced by GSM carriers. It made sense: The same companies that backed GSM also backed DVBH, and Qualcomm lay behind both CDMA and MediaFLO.
Skip forward to today, and the situation is much different. There are no real DVB-H vendors in the U.S. market, and Qualcomm’s MediaFLO has a vice-grip on the space.
And one could argue that it’s all due to AT&T Mobility.
See, earlier this year AT&T Mobility embraced Qualcomm-once a heated enemy-by agreeing to use its MediaFLO network for mobile TV services. The move gave Qualcomm two of the U.S. market’s most powerful customers, AT&T Mobility and Verizon Wireless, and access to more than half of the nation’s wireless customers.
Thus, the two DVB-H vendors in the United States, Crown Castle’s Modeo and Aloha Partners’ Hiwire, were left to court Sprint Nextel and T-Mobile USA, the two remaining nationwide carriers. However, with Sprint Nextel embroiled in a number of troubling business situations and T-Mobile USA focused on its 3G buildout, neither apparently showed interest in a mobile TV deal.
Due to the slim pickings, Modeo quietly bowed out earlier this year, and just last week Aloha cashed in by selling its 700 MHz spectrum to AT&T Mobility.
But the really interesting question is this: Did AT&T Mobility sign a deal with MediaFLO in the hopes of starving Aloha into selling its spectrum?
If so, it was a cunning move: AT&T Mobility will get a mobile TV service running through Qualcomm’s MediaFLO system as well as valuable 700 MHz spectrum. Win-win, indeed.
AT&T Mobility has not said what it will do with Aloha’s 700 MHz spectrum, for which it paid $2.5 billion. With the 700 MHz auction starting in just a few months, let’s hope its something equally cunning.