Harris Corporation has signed an agreement with Albavision (Angel Gonzalez Group) to implement the recently introduced Harris full mobile digital TV transmission platform for broadcast operations in Guatemala and Costa Rica

First to roll out the new Harris mobile TV platform in Latin America will be Radio Television Guatemala and REPRETEL in Costa Rica. Albavision will be the, with plans to implement in other properties throughout the region in later stages.

The mobile digital TV transmission platform is expected to be available by November 2008 and is based on the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) mobile/handheld standard proposed by LG Electronics, Zenith and Harris Corporation and recently joined by Samsung. ATSC is itself based primarily upon elements of the Mobile-Pedestrian-Handheld (MPH) technology developed by Harris, LG Electronics and Zenith as well as Samsung's Advanced Vestigial Sideband (A-VSB) system.

"Radio Television Guatemala and REPRETEL have existing Harris ATSC transmitter installations and have been broadcasting in the ATSC standard for more than a year," commend Juan Pablo Alviz, CTO of Albavision. "Therefore, we are very excited to take the next step and be the first broadcast operation in the Latin American region to broadcast to mobile devices using the new Harris mobile TV platform.

"The new proposed ATSC standard capability will allow us to integrate our current high-definition infrastructure and the capacity of mobile television without the need to incur a major investment. This is possible by making efficient use of spectrum when combining high-definition content for residences and lower resolution content for mobile units - both within the same transmission frequency and infrastructure."

"ATSC adoption is increasing within the CALA region, and Harris is pleased to play a significant role in Albavision's mobile DTV evolution," added Nahuel Villegas, vice president for the Latin America and Caribbean (CALA region), Harris Broadcast Communications. "The proposed solution offers broadcasters such as Albavision a proven, reliable solution for local, mobile TV services. Broadcasters can count on Harris to provide complete mobile DTV transmission solutions that offer new revenue streams through new multimedia content."