ATSC 3.0 Nextgen TV is the newest version of free over-the-air TV with new options and abilities like on-demand and interactive TV. To get this new version of TV with your antenna, you need a supported tuner.
For the first time, Panasonic will be launching a new line of Fire TV smart TVs that will come with built-in ATSC 3.0 Nextgen TV tuners. These Fire TV smart TVs will beat Roku to market with a tuner built into your TV.
They will be OLED with mini-LEDs and will start shipping on September 18 with both 1.0 and 3.0 tuners, according to a report from AFTVnews.
Last year, LG stopped making TVs with ATSC 3.0. LG lost a patent case from a company claiming to hold patents over some of the technology included in ATSC 3.0 Nextgen TV.
“This challenging and uncertain patent landscape has forced LG to make the difficult decision to suspend the inclusion of ATSC 3.0-compatibility in its 2024 television lineup for the United States. This decision was not made lightly, because LG has been a vocal ATSC 3.0 advocate, a strong supporter of local broadcasters, and a leading developer of television products with the latest NEXTGEN TV technologies. Going forward, LG will, of course, continue to monitor the patent landscape and its effect on LG’s own product roadmap and overall industry dynamics,” LG said in a statement to the FCC.
LG has asked the FCC to investigate how it can help address issues over patents related to the ATSC 3.0 Nextgen TV technology. Currently, most patent holders are working to make it easy to license patents for companies wanting to build ATSC 3.0 tuners. According to LG, a few are not working together to make it easy to build TVs with the new tuners.
So far it seems fear over these patents have kept many manufacturers away from jumping into ATSC 3.0 support.