After the market failure of Qualcomm FLO and other mobile TV services, nobody seems to be getting very excited about recent announcements involving Dyle, the mobile TV offering created by traditional television broadcasters. But after talking recently with two of the people behind Dyle, I think it will be important not to underestimate what the broadcasters are working to launch later this year.

Dyle was made possible by the digital television conversion completed in 2009. Digital broadcasts don’t require as much spectrum as the analog broadcasts they replaced, and in addition to freeing up spectrum for auction for mobile broadband, the conversion left individual broadcasters with more bandwidth than they needed just for traditional TV broadcasts.

As Erik Moreno, senior vice president of corporate development for Fox News Group explained, participation in Dyle requires a station in to invest about $125,000 to $150,000 in infrastructure in an individual market and to dedicate about two megabits of the 19.4 megabits that each station was allotted after the digital conversion.

More than 72 stations in 32 markets covering more than 50 percent of the U.S. population are participating in Dyle, according to Mobile Content Venture (MCV), a joint venture of Fox, NBC, Pearl Mobile DTV and ION created to support Dyle. And although available channels will vary from market to market, Salil Dalvi, senior vice president and general manager of strategic ventures for NBCUniversal, said certain large networks -- including Fox and NBC -- will be available in many of the 32 markets.

Participating broadcasters are leveraging their installed base of equipment, people, antennas and towers to support the offering, said Dalvi. “The investment creates another exciter and creates a mobile signal,” he explained.

The coverage area is about five to 10 percent shy of what each station reaches now with its traditional television broadcasts, Dalvi explained. Because Dyle was designed to support coverage in vehicles moving 80 miles per hour or more, he said coverage at the outer edges of a service area will be reduced.

Initially at least, Dyle broadcasts will be offered at no charge. To receive the broadcasts, end users will need to buy a Samsung smartphone from MetroPCS that has Dyle capability built in. Alternatively, they can buy a matchbox-sized adapter from Belkin that enables Android or  iOS smartphones to receive the broadcasts. Pricing for the Samsung (News - Alert) and Belkin products has not yet been released.

MCV expects other manufacturers to also support the product. Moreno said MCV wants Dyle to work with “anything with a screen,” including in-car devices.

Currently stations supporting Dyle will broadcast the same programming that goes to traditional televisions, and MCV says that’s a significant advantage over what FLO provided.

The technology underlying Dyle can support “clear to air” communications that can be seen by everyone with the appropriate end-user device. Alternatively, it can support encrypted communications, and in the future, encryption could be used to support a subscription-based or authentication model.

Moving forward, Dalvi said there are “lots of ways we could envision making money.”

Broadcasters, he said, will have the ability to measure usage so advertisers will know how many people viewed an ad on a mobile device. In addition, the Dyle technology also can support interactive applications. Dalvi cited the hypothetical example of someone who sees an ad for a car he is interested in and then reaches a car dealer offering that model through a click-to-call function.

In addition to local content, MCV points out a couple of other advantages that Dyle has in comparison with what Qualcomm (News - Alert) tried to do with FLO. For one, FLO came out in a pre-iPhone, pre-Android world when consumers were not so accustomed to using the web and video on their phones. In addition, Qualcomm’s investment in FLO was considerably more than what broadcasters are investing to support Dyle, MCV noted.

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO East 2012, happening NOW in Miami, FL. ITEXPO (News - Alert) offers an educational program to help corporate decision makers select the right IP-based voice, video, fax and unified communications solutions to improve their operations. It's also where service providers learn how to profitably roll out the services their subscribers are clamoring for – and where resellers can learn about new growth opportunities. For more information on registering for ITEXPO registration click here.

Stay in touch with everything happening at ITEXPO. Follow us on Twitter.