BANGKOK, 19 August 2015 – Operators of 4 free television channels met with the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC) and agreed to terminate their analog signals by 2018.
The meeting yesterday was attended by representatives from the ThaiPBS Channel, the Royal Thai Army Radio and Television Channel 5, the National Broadcasting Services of Thailand (NBT), Modernine TV, and members of the civil sector and academics.
The four stations agreed to completely stop the broadcasting of its analog TV by 2018, with ThaiPBS stating that it would initiate the process later this year in Ubon Ratchathani, Chiang Mai and Surat Thani. Channel 5 would begin to phase out its analog broadcasting system from 2017 onward.
Meanwhile, NBT and Modern 9 TV would stop their analog signals in 2017 and 2018 respectively. The shutdown of analog signals for both NBT and Modern 9 TV would be done all at once, rather than using the phasing out method like the two earlier mentioned channels.
All the four channels vowed to take into consideration the readiness of its audience in each area for the new digital broadcasting system before proceeding with the termination of their analog signals.
