TVJ Lights Up Jamaica's Second ATSC 3.0 Transmitter

TV Jamaica
(Image credit: TV Jamaica)

KINGSTON, Jamaica—Television Jamaica (TVJ) switched on its second NextGenTV transmitter last weekend in Montego Bay, the country’s second largest city. 

In January this year, TVJ led Jamaica to become the third country in the world to switch on a NextGen TV transmission service, located at its head office at the Lyndhurst Road Broadcasting House facility in Kingston. The switch on of the second transmitter happened in western Jamaica from TVJ’s Flower Hill tower in Montego Bay, St. James on Sunday. Signals from this site will be showcased at a special workshop conference on ATSC 3.0 being held in Trelawny from July 11-14. The conference is featuring a special bootcamp that is being delivered by members of the Advanced Television Standards Committee (ATSC) Inc, an organization of which TVJ is a member.

This four-day bootcamp is being presented by ATSC Inc in partnership with the Broadcasting Commission of Jamaica and the Spectrum Management Authority, at the Ocean Coral Spring hotel in Trelawny.

Gary Allen, Chief Executive Officer of the RJRGLEANER Group (RG), of which TVJ is a member is very pleased with progress of the roll out. “The team has been working well in pulling together all that is required to achieve a structured and systematic deployment of this new digital transmission standard for Jamaica,” he said. “Having switched on our first site in the nation’s capital, the island’s second city was the next logical choice,” he added.

Jamaica is third behind South Korea and the United States of America in the adoption and transmission of an ATSC 3.0 digital terrestrial television service, widely accepted as the NextGeneration of television services.

Michael Henlin, Chief Technology Officer for RG, who switched on this second transmitter, is satisfied with the strength of the local team in executing the roll out of this new technology.

“We continue to learn and grow with each execution of this roll out and we are very excited about the improved service being offered and the additional services that we will be able to offer to our audiences. On this occasion the transmitter brought on stream is from the French headquartered company, Thomson Broadcast, that has an engineer on the ground working with the TVJ team.

Tom Butts

Tom has covered the broadcast technology market for the past 25 years, including three years handling member communications for the National Association of Broadcasters followed by a year as editor of Video Technology News and DTV Business executive newsletters for Phillips Publishing. In 1999 he launched digitalbroadcasting.com for internet B2B portal Verticalnet. He is also a charter member of the CTA's Academy of Digital TV Pioneers. Since 2001, he has been editor-in-chief of TV Tech (www.tvtech.com), the leading source of news and information on broadcast and related media technology and is a frequent contributor and moderator to the brand’s Tech Leadership events.