The End of DIRECTV?

[Jimbo]

I never said it was good, bad or indifferent to lure DirecTV subscribers into other AT&T services. I just made a comment that if that is their plan, which by all indications it is, I and a lot of others will not being playing along as AT&T has no other presence here.

I'm in Western NY state, the Northeast is owned by Verizon going back to NYNEX, the spawn of the original Satan aka AT&T. Verizon owns a lot of copper, Verizon owns a lot of fiber. As far as market share for wireless, they are by far the dominate of the four carriers, because they have the coverage where others don't. There will be very few DirecTV subscribers up here who will switch to AT&T Mobility and subscribe to some DirecTV/AT&T streaming service combo for a small discount or unlimited data. So instead of AT&T having at least one service in a lot of homes, DirecTV, they will have none. Maybe things will be different in areas where AT&T is the ILEC, where they provide U-Verse TV and 1 Gb fiber and where they have better wireless service. In my neck of the woods people only know AT&T as a subpar wireless provider.

Thats the same way Verizon copper is in my area ... they owned it (before that it was GTE) ... Cell is different, they are here as well as ATT and Sprint and T-Mobile ... though T-Mobile uses towers from others.
As far as copper goes, Verizon seen how bad it was up here and sold to Frontier and Frontier has done nothing with it, so no one uses it ... the local Cable TV/Internet company handles I would guess 75% of the city.r
Frontiers latest push for the high speed internet is at a whopping 12 mbbs ... I say whopping because last year they touted 1 mbps.

 

[goaliebob99]

Fiber isn't free, they're paying someone for that connection every month. But I'd be willing to guess that that feed is also being used to supply the local channels for DIRECTV Now.

Nah, They just laid out their own fiber. No need to pay anyone when you have your own capability to not lease space from anyone, and bring in as much capacity you want. From NYC to LA. For what DirecTV used to lease, they don't need it because ATT has their own network and just had to tap into it from all the uplinks.

You don't need expensive uplink centers filled with expensive engineers to stream....

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That's correct to a point hopefully they have their staffing levels where they want them given the number of layoffs we have seen, but never say never.

They need to RECEIVE the uplinks from all the networks. That one giant elliptical dish they have that has like 30-40 LNBs probably cost more than all the uplink dishes they have combined.

IP is the primary delivery now. Those toroidal dishes are primary for sports feeds and as a backup should they lose a fiber feed. I don't think people here realize the scope and massiveness of ATT's IP network.

Fiber is much cheaper..when you own a huge network

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Yep you got it!

A nice General Dynamics 13.2m basic dish might be more in the $2mil range installed and for $5mil on up you get something in the 9m range with an array of TWTAs and associated equipment mounted in the hub.

Each uplink is probably around 50 million when you consider all of the equipment and both primary and diverse sites. You factor in probably around 250 million alone for all of the regional uplinks, not counting Castlerock and LABC, CBC and Bakersfield. I'm sure when you count everything it's pretty close to 1B.

 

[slice1900]

Each uplink is probably around 50 million when you consider all of the equipment and both primary and diverse sites. You factor in probably around 250 million alone for all of the regional uplinks, not counting Castlerock and LABC, CBC and Bakersfield. I'm sure when you count everything it's pretty close to 1B.

That's all sunk costs though, they will never need to build a new uplink dish unless a tornado hits Castle Rock and definitely never need to build another broadcast center. I'm sure that equipment requires maintenance and that's not free, but the cost to build it is irrelevant to the calculations on the future of satellite since they've already done it.

 

[Inclined Orbit]

I was only speaking of a single modern uplink antenna with all its internal trimmings @ $5mil. I also think you are a bit off on the cost of a "broadcast center" if that's what your calling an "uplink" For example, the entire CBC cost right around $100m when first built in 1995 but some of its later upgrades cost nearly half that and there have been many upgrades at all sites over the years. BTW, the CBC was the smallest Directv site when it was built.

I also don't think IP is the primary delivery for most common stuff, its still brought in from C/Ku satellite, however LiL is a different beast using a lot of IP.

Each uplink is probably around 50 million when you consider all of the equipment and both primary and diverse sites. You factor in probably around 250 million alone for all of the regional uplinks, not counting Castlerock and LABC, CBC and Bakersfield. I'm sure when you count everything it's pretty close to 1B.

 

[goaliebob99]

I was only speaking of a single modern uplink antenna with all its internal trimmings @ $5mil. I also think you are a bit off on the cost of a "broadcast center" if that's what your calling an "uplink" For example, the entire CBC cost right around $100m when first built in 1995 but some of its later upgrades cost nearly half that and there have been many upgrades at all sites over the years. BTW, the CBC was the smallest Directv site when it was built.

I also don't think IP is the primary delivery for most common stuff, its still brought in from C/Ku satellite, however LiL is a different beast using a lot of IP.

I'm talking about the RUF's at 4-6 antennas each RUF. Outside of the antenna infrastructure outside, inside there isn't much. Just your run of the mill modulator's and LDA's and other related equipment. Take away the compression equipment and host that elsewhere you don't need much at the RUF's or even the major broadcast centers. Bring that stuff to the cloud and your uplink sites become just that. Yes, CBC, LABC and CRBC would cost more. You would be surprised at how much is being brought in through those IP pops around the country, especially on the national channels, and where AT&T will take things in the next few years. I know for a fact that ESPN/ABC and FOX's content is IP delivered primary, and I think Discovery is as well. Locals the same thing. Amazon Web Services will have a huge part in things.

 

[Inclined Orbit]

I'm not surprised at all, I worked for them for 18yrs , saw all the stuff flying around the huge fiber ring around the country and helped build lots of broadcast center and other infrastructure.

You would be surprised at how much is being brought in through those IP pops around the country, especially on the national channels, and where AT&T will take things in the next few years. I know for a fact that ESPN/ABC and FOX's content is IP delivered primary, and I think Discovery is as well. Locals the same thing. Amazon Web Services will have a huge part in things.

 

[907TECH]

Reading the mail, interesting speculation going on to be sure. Satellite delivery is not going away anytime soon.

 

[bamasat]

News IS this week:
DirecTV Now as it is called AND aligned ( composed channel line ups and tiers) will be scrapped completely.
The uncapped Internet is a motivational transition tool for the new " things " to come.



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Hmmm....
It's March - there were a few post pertaining of mine from December I think.
Moving fast I'd say.
Not done either.


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[Juan]

Reading the mail, interesting speculation going on to be sure. Satellite delivery is not going away anytime soon.

Atleast not until they fail

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[Claude Greiner]

Wouldn’t surprise me if they had some sort of converter on homes that had fiber that could provide the directv signal without a dish

 

[ncted]

Interesting article on the topic:

AT&T Can't Get Out Of Its Own Way - AT&T Inc. (NYSE:T) | Seeking Alpha

 

[slice1900]

While I generally agree with his sentiment (if not his exact reasoning which I find lacking) that AT&T's TV strategy is a mess, he's talking about AT&T's stock price as if delivering TV to consumers (i.e. the Directv part) was their only business.

If they are able to leverage fixed wireless 5G and AirGig to add tens of millions of new broadband subscribers they will make so much money that profit reductions on the Directv side won't stop their stock price from rising. On the other hand, if they have problems in the cellular sector no amount of success on the Directv side will prevent the stock from plummeting.

 

[mdram]

the customers that trully need the 5g and airgig will be the last to get it. those are the rural customers sho have no internet options.
customers in more populated areas already have broadband

 

[slice1900]

the customers that trully need the 5g and airgig will be the last to get it. those are the rural customers sho have no internet options.
customers in more populated areas already have broadband

AirGig is designed for rural areas. It won't work in many populated areas because it requires overhead power lines.

 

[mdram]

AirGig is designed for rural areas. It won't work in many populated areas because it requires overhead power lines.

and as i have already said, some rural areas have buried powerlines, i know its getting popular in this area

 

[slice1900]

and as i have already said, some rural areas have buried powerlines, i know its getting popular in this area

Areas with buried power lines probably have conduit for fiber runs, so they don't need AirGig to provide fixed wireless backhaul.

 

[mdram]

Areas with buried power lines probably have conduit for fiber runs, so they don't need AirGig to provide fixed wireless backhaul.

nope not all do. buried power lines have been used in this area for over 40 years (im 48 and they had them when i was a kid)


the fiber in the area is for cell tower backhaul (verizon) or electric meter reading (electric company) and not available for the consumer.

 

[slice1900]

nope not all do. buried power lines have been used in this area for over 40 years (im 48 and they had them when i was a kid)


the fiber in the area is for cell tower backhaul (verizon) or electric meter reading (electric company) and not available for the consumer.

AirGig is for cell "tower" (microantennas for customer fixed wireless delivery) backhaul, so fiber for cell tower backhaul eliminates the need for it. Basically the only reason you'd ever want to use AirGig is in very rural areas where copper is your only option for backhaul. There are huge swathes of the US where that's the case though, where it will never be economic to run fiber unless heavily subsidized like rural electrification was.

 

[mdram]

AirGig is for cell "tower" (microantennas for customer fixed wireless delivery) backhaul, so fiber for cell tower backhaul eliminates the need for it. Basically the only reason you'd ever want to use AirGig is in very rural areas where copper is your only option for backhaul. There are huge swathes of the US where that's the case though, where it will never be economic to run fiber unless heavily subsidized like rural electrification was.

i would have agreed on you with this, until my electric coop ran fiber to read meters.
how they heck did they manage to budget that, of course being a non profit helps

 

[primestar31]

My last 8 years at work were spent in a Fortune 500 worldwide company NOC, working 12 hour shifts. You wouldn't believe what accidentally severing a single fiber cable can do to company networks all over the world, depending on how "lucky" the cutter was in hitting the right fiber.