Kessler report calls for 2-3 year digital radio moratorium

David Kessler, a jurist and former head of France Culture radio, has presented a report to prime minister Francois Fillon in which he proposes a two or three year moratorium on the deployment of a national digital terrestrial radio (DTR) network. Following wide reaching consultation with the relevant actors (public radio broadcasting service, private stations, transmission service providers, equipment manufacturers, car makers, etc) he concluded that all of the conditions are not in place, financially, to enable a large scale deployment of DTR. Given the investment required, level of interest in the technology and alternative means of delivering digital radio, it does not make economic sense to proceed. And the state can not afford to be the sole investor in DTR. Private radio broadcasters said they, too, would be unable to meet the costs of analogue and digital simulcasting for any extended period due to the uncertainty of new advertising income generation. Independent and not-for-profit stations were keener on DTR, if it provided equal or greater diversity than the FM band. Transmission service providers see in DTR a business opportunity but not if the major radio networks do not come onboard. The public broadcaster confirmed its interest in DTR to achieve nearly 100 percent coverage of the territory for its seven stations. Audiovisual regulator CSA said it was prepared to run tenders for DTR service provision over large geographic areas. The Kessler report recommends that during the moratorium a public-private analysis unit be formed under the aegis of the CSA to consider DTR in other countries, transmission standards and other means of delivering digital radio.