Related article:

Next generation terrestrial TV platforms such as ATSC 3.0 have been designed to help broadcasters upgrade their services, embrace interactivity and reach mobile devices. They are also designed to help broadcasters counter the big streamers’ services and offer new non-TV services that exploit the reach of these platforms.

Yet not all broadcasters are on the same page, with some arguing that spectrum is becoming more of a liability than an asset, with their future lying in content rather than delivery of new services over the air. Indeed, some contend it is more important to embrace all the online and social platforms in order to satisfy their remit of ubiquitous public access, even though that brings new risks, such as erosion of brand recognition. With both directions being pursued, sometimes in parallel, in this article we consider some of the issues and challenges.

Messaging Beyond Television

The idea of exploiting airwaves to deliver messaging of public value beyond entertainment, documentary and news is nothing new of itself. Broadcasters have been doing it over both TV and radio from the outset, with services like the BBC SOS Message Service, for example, issuing SOS messages to next of kin when somebody has been taken ill.

The rise of mobile technology has made such personal communications redundant, but now broadcasters have an opportunity to offer services involving large scale delivery, on either a local or national basis. These include over the air (OTA) software updates, datacasting, location-based services, emergency messaging, and on demand streaming.

The ability of the new generation of DTT platforms to support a variety of emerging services with interactivity, including the potential to reach mobile devices if the handsets support the technology, has attracted growing interest among many PSBs (Public Service Broadcasters). The debate has come to a head in the US with the advent of ATSC 3.0, driven in part by the nature of the country’s broadcasting hinterland comprising national networks as well as local stations of varying sizes, all with skin in the game.

An Ideological Shift

The issue erupted in February 2026 when Weigel, a privately held broadcaster based in Chicago operating local stations in various markets, filed a complaint over the direction of ATSC 3.0 to the regulator FCC. Weigel argued that ATSC 3.0 was actually being promoted as a route to migration away from traditional broadcasting towards areas such as datacasting and conditional access, to the detriment of its viewers.

The timing is significant in that the FCC is currently considering whether to drop the requirement that stations simulcast in ATSC 1.0 while ATSC 3.0 is being rolled out. The idea is that this allows individual broadcasters to decide if and when to switch off the legacy signal. But in practice, according to Weigel, as soon as large station groups drop ATSC 1.0, the standard’s economics would unravel quickly. Consumers without ATSC 3.0 TV tuners would lose access to these major stations and ad value would then fall, leaving smaller broadcasters with a diminished platform such that they would be compelled to follow for their very survival.

Not surprisingly, this argument is rejected by the bigger stations which are themselves interested in the potential for new services. The ATSC itself has also weighed in, dismissing smaller stations such as Weigel as “self-interested naysayers downplaying the importance of this transition and its benefits for viewers and the public.”`

Weigel seems to be not objecting to ATSC 3.0 in principle; just the way it is being rolled out and the emerging pressure to drop simulcasting, as well as the commercial drift away from traditional TV. ATSC may also be nervous that its NexGen TV may flounder for lack of full support across the industry, as well as from mobile device makers.

This spat highlights tensions and issues around evolving broadcast services not just in the US but more widely. Amid significant differences between regions, countries and individual broadcasters, a common theme lies in attempting to arrest what can look like almost terminal decline in viewing share and revenues in the face of a continuing onslaught from major streamers and big tech.

A Collaborative Response To Big Tech

In Europe the collective response lies in a collaboration between broadcasters to pool resources and court efficiencies, along with regulatory kickback against those major streamers, almost exclusively from the US. The most recent action was taken in March 2026 with a statement from the Association of Commercial Television and Video on Demand Services in Europe (ACT) exhorting the European Commission to designate smart TV operating systems and virtual assistant platforms such as Apple’s Siri as gatekeepers.

This notion of gatekeeping emerged under the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) in September 2023, when its executive body, the European Commission, defined it as being a company or organization providing at least one of a pre-defined set of digital services – so called core platform services (CPSs). A gateway is then a CPS provider deemed to have a significant effect on the EU’s internal market, usually by being required to access some key service and to have an established market position.

CPSs are defined as having a significant presence in at least one of 10 categories:

1. Search Engines
2. Online Social Networking Services
3. Video Sharing Services
4. Cloud Computing Services
5. Web Browsers
6. Operating Systems
7. App Stores
8. Messaging Services
9. Advertising Services
10. Other Services (specific services not detailed in the results).  These services are crucial for enabling interoperability and compliance across digital platforms within the EU.

The European Commissioner identified six CPSs as gatekeepers: Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta, and Microsoft. Later, in May 2024, Booking Holdings was added for its dominant online intermediation service Booking.com. That left six companies from the US and one from China, ByteDance, as defined gatekeeping entities.

The UK has also been acting to clip the wings of big tech with the country’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) confirming in October 2025 that both Apple and Google had been accorded with strategic market status (SMS) for their respective mobile platforms. These cover operating systems, app distribution, browsers and browser engines on smartphones and tablets, embracing video services.

If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Join ‘Em

Yet while such regulatory maneuvers may help smaller online competitors, they will do little by themselves to help broadcasters fend off competition from alternative video service providers. Indeed, many PSBs seem to have adopted the motto that if they cannot beat the big tech challengers they should join them by making their content available on the platforms. This can also be seen as part of their public service remit to make their programming as widely available as possible over all platforms used by consumers.

This in turn is creating new challenges, including higher content costs to meet the diverse requirements of different online platforms, and maintaining the brand recognition to sustain public trust and willingness to pay license fees. The BBC has admitted to facing these problems as it pivots more towards alternative outlets, such as YouTube, than some of its peers. While its iPlayer portal has for years been its online medium of choice for live and on demand content, a growing proportion of viewing occurs over third-party platforms, with efforts being required to ensure that the brand is prominently displayed.

Yet there is some evidence the BBC is on the right track focusing on content without regard for the medium. BBC Studios, its main commercial arm for content production, has been increasing profits at a healthy rate over recent years, up by 11% to £225 million for 2024/2025, the latest full year recorded. Its commercial FTA rival ITV has also witnessed growth in its ITV Studios division to help offset decline in its traditional linear advertising.

Then in January 2026 the BBC bowed to the inevitable by striking what it described as a landmark deal with YouTube to make original content for the platform. This was appropriately the month that total UK viewing of YouTube content overtook that of BBC content across all outlets, according to UK ratings agency BARB.

Hailed as a tipping point for TV, it raised the prospect of the BBC making content for release on YouTube ahead of other outlets. In return it offers a potentially lucrative new revenue stream that could well offset the increased production costs resulting from producing content geared to the platform. Such content is not necessarily short form only, noting that You Tube viewing has been increasing on big screen TVs on the back of rising internet connectivity. In the US over 11% of all TV viewing is now of YouTube content, according to audience analytics group Nielsen.

Controlling Costs & Consolidating Content

For PSBs in general, control of costs across production and workflow has become as critical as maintaining viewing levels, with an inevitable sense of managing decline. This has driven collaborations not just over content production but also workflow in some cases.

In some countries such consolidation has been pushed by regulatory action inspired by the existential threat to PSBs. For example, the German Broadcaster Reform Treaty was enacted in October 2024 to streamline public broadcasting in the country. The treaty underlined the imperative for ARD, ZDF, and Deutschlandradio to become leaner, consolidating channels and some services between them.

This came into force in December 2025 when ARD and ZDF agreed to start merging their specialist TV channels. The move was both administrative and editorial, aiming to consolidate programming as well as the underlying workflow. Inevitably, this involved use of AI to automate as many processes as possible as part of this convergence exercise.

There is an aim to move away from fragmented, narrowly targeted niche channels toward more substantial, flagship journalistic outlets likely to exert a more sustained public impact. The idea is to shore up viewing figures while cutting costs across the whole workflow.

Other Tactics

Some broadcasters are resorting to more desperate measures in an attempt to stem revenue decline. Japan’s NHK has engaged in a major reform package currently being implemented by Tatsuhiko Inoue, who was appointed president of the company in January 2026.

Like many PSBs, NHK has been running a growing deficit in license fee income, projected at 40 billion Yen ($248 million) for the 2025 financial year. The broadcaster is tapping reserve funds to make up this deficit, as well as to execute structural reforms.

The big idea is to start charging for online access through its NHK ONE internet platform, which offers real-time streaming and catch-up services. From October 2025, NHK has required users to pay a fee for what it now designates as mandatory services. It is almost a license fee for the streaming age, aiming to ensure that all users pay even if they only access online.

Moves like this run against the grain of the growing acceptance that the era of license fees is running down. In reality, the future lies in a combination of compelling content, as well as a continuation of public service provision, which means free at the point of access, whatever the medium.

The question remaining is over the future of OTA delivery and whether next generation platforms will succeed in squaring the circle between delivery of traditional TV programming and ancillary services.