ARK Multicasting Inc. (ARK) announced today a collaboration agreement with SpectraRep® to deploy the Educast™ service on the ARK Broadcast Internet Network of NextGen TV stations. ARK and SpectraRep will lead a first-mover advantage in driving early and growing revenue streams for non-television content delivery through the early entry and rapid growth of ATSC 3.0 technologies.
ARK’s commitment to help bridge the digital divide for rural communities will significantly improve the quality of education for students and teachers from K-12 and college students who lack sufficient broadband access.
“We can help solve and even eliminate a major pain point for millions of K-12, college students, and teachers in rural America,” according to Josh Weiss, Co-Founder & CEO, Ark Multicasting. “This new hybrid broadcast-broadband technology is a complete gamechanger allowing a one-to-many reach which serves as an accretive augmentation to traditional Internet providers struggling with network congestion and last-mile connectivity.”
Through EduCast seamlessly operating on ARK’s ATSC 3.0 spectrum, the most widely deployed broadcast distance learning service in the U.S. can reach millions of students on ARK’s network of LPTV stations across 39 states.
“The Covid-19 pandemic sent students and teachers home negatively impacting remote learners without access to adequate broadband,” said Mark O’Brien, President and CTO of SpectraRep. “We realized that we could use our technology with the new ATSC 3.0 broadcast Internet to solve problems in education such as homework gaps and equity much the same way we’ve supported public safety and law enforcement customers.”
With ATSC 3.0 NextGen TV on the ARK network along with SpectraRep’s EduCast, teachers can securely provide their assignments to students so they can study on their own time. This system works seamlessly with whatever learning management system the teachers already use whether it is Google Classroom, Canvas, Blackboard, and others. With EduCast, educators can reach their students more efficiently and have more options when it comes to education.
About SpectraRep
SpectraRep® is the leading provider of datacasting solutions, applications and systems for education, homeland security, public safety, law enforcement, and mass media sectors. SpectraRep works with television stations throughout the US offering their datacasting solution to provide a robust wireless one-to-many data delivery network that connects teachers to students without broadband and compliments existing public safety networks. For more information, visit www.spectrarep.com or contact [email protected].
About ARK Multicasting, Inc.
ARK Multicasting, a leading-edge Next Gen TV company is based in Dallas. ARK is leveraging the power of TV broadcasting adding an IP multicast extension to the unicast Internet. ARK is on the forefront of Broadcast Internet Service development with solutions to relieve congestion for Internet Service Providers and provide datacasting services for many verticals including distance learning, the connected car market, smart agriculture, telehealth, and over the top video streaming providers. ARK’s footprint of ~300 broadcast assets covering 1/3rd of the United States and ~100 million people is leading the industry in Next Gen TV ATSC 3.0. Further information visit www.ARKMulticasting.com.
