Capitol Broadcasting Company (CBC) launched ATSC 3.0 broadcasts of its WRAL NBC affiliate, WRAZ Fox affiliate and WARZ-CD (Retro TV), which is currently owned by Waters and Brock Communications but has been sold to CRC pending FCC approval, on Dec. 15, expanding the lineup of NextGen TV channels in the market.
Pending FCC regulatory approval, WUNC (UNC-TV, PBS) will launch over the next few weeks, CBC said. With the four stations and last month’s launch of Nexstar’s WNCN (CBS), WTVD (an ABC O&O), WUVC (Univision) and Sinclair Broadcast Group’s WLFL (CW) and WRDC (MyNet), the market becomes one of the few in the nation with all major networks supporting NextGen TV, CBC said.
“TV is the greatest wireless technology you forgot about,” said CBC President and COO Jimmy Goodmon. “NextGen TV is the next step in the evolution of free over-the-air television with new benefits like mobile broadcasting, personalization for viewers, advancements in rich, interactive media plus a much improved emergency alert system. It’s next level.”
In late June 2016, WRAL launched over-the-air ATSC 3.0 service with simulcasts of its noon news in 1080p HD and a 22-minute 4K/UHD HDR documentary on a separate channel operated with an FCC experimental license. WRAL ceased that 3.0 transmission in September 2019 as part of the FCC TV spectrum repack.
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