RSSSirius, XM Struggle to Appease FCC
By Ed Oswald | Published July 20, 2006, 12:03 PM
Sirius disclosed Thursday that it had been the target of an FCC inquiry regarding the FM transmitters in some of its radios. Based on an internal review, the second largest satellite radio provider has pulled several radios from store shelves. XM announced a similar inquiry in April.
The company first received notice from the FCC on June 20, according to an SEC filing. After completion of an internal investigation, the company responded to the letter on July 12 with preliminary results. Sirius did not specify which radios were not in compliance.
The internal review also determined that unnamed Sirius personnel requested that the radios still be manufactured even though they were not within FCC emission limits. The company said it was taking steps to prevent this from happening again, including the adoption of a plan that would ensure compliance with FCC standards before public release.
While Sirius' internal review is complete, the company disclosed that the FCC's review was still ongoing. Sirius will consult with the FCC to obtain new authorizations, although it did say that the agency was reviewing its own procedures for testing.
"If the FCC were to change its test parameters, our new products may be found to be non-compliant, requiring us to make further changes in our products and possibly delaying the availability of these products to consumers," it wrote in the filing.
In related news, XM Satellite Radio disclosed in a SEC filing Wednesday that it recently received notice that modified designs of its radios that were affected by the FCC order had been dismissed. Since the designs were dismissed and not denied, the company will have a chance to modify them and resubmit, the company said.
XM said it was working quickly to limit interruptions to supplies of XM radios, which has been blamed for the company's poor showing in subscriber additions in the past quarter. The company recently had to lower its yearly subscriber guidance as a result.
However, XM said it wasn't clear how the company would be affected this time. "We can provide no assurances at this time that our actions will be deemed sufficient by the FCC, or that this matter will not have a material impact on our consolidated results of operations or financial position," it said.
Stocks of both companies were down as a result Thursday; Sirius down 1.2 percent to $4.08, and XM down five percent to $11.88 in mid-day trading.
All it takes is a lot of money to appease the FCC.
Comcast succeeded in appeasing the FCC with the big bucks. The FCC sided with Comcast in allowing them to keep Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia a channel available exclusively on Comcast Cable. No SatTV access :P.
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|hasn't a radio been developed yet that doesn't require an fm transmitter? One that receives the signal and broadcasts it over it's own band?
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|You could possibly do that, but then you just put yourself out of 98% of cars out there. You need the transmitter to allow people to hear the service, as most do not have an option of a tape adapter, aux in or being able to splice into their antenna line to listen.
The issue that the FCC has with these units are that there have been complaints from people who have stumbled on the signals about the content. There were also a few XM units that broadcasted with enough power that they could still be picked up a football field away, effectively double what it should have been. The problem is that a fair amount of the units in production on both sides are over the limit in some way.
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|But you know, I would happily replace the radio in my car with one that has satellite, FM and AM bands on it without having to have a device mounted to the dash of my car.
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|What the hell? Since the FCC can't go after satellite radio because of what they put on the air, they're trying to go after them because of this? Why the hell does satellite radio haf FM transmitters in them anyway? Whats up with people and FM transmitters, I read reviews on MP3 players "CON: No FM transmitter". Do I use the FM transmitter in my MP3 player NO. I have an FM transmitter on my TV tuner card, do I use it? NO why because internet radio is better. Take the FM transmitters out of everything and let the FCC go away. This is just sad.
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|They were FM transmitters, not FM tuners. Your TV tuner card would have an FM tuner to tune into radio stations. XM portable devices need FM transmitters so that you can listen to it on your car stereo.
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|The little old lady next door, must have stumbled on to the Howard Stern show, with her husband's police scanner! The high end models are able to randomly search broad chunks of FM spectrum well into the 2 GHZ band.
You'd be surprised at what you might find stuffed between a TV channel's audio and video carrier frequencies. I found our local NPR station's studio uplinkk on 950 mhz. So why be surprised if you stumble upon the neighbor's XM or Sirius receivers. This will still happen even if the power is turned down and they continue using FM analog modulation schemes...
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|One of my buddies actually told me to tune into 88.1 and he drove behind me playing Howard Stern, and i picked it up on my radio crystal clear all the way down the road until he veered off down another road...
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