The Abinader administration announced it is again postponing the start of digital television in the Dominican Republic. The Presidency issued Decree 437-2022 whereby Indotel is instructed to establish a road map for the implementation of Digital Terrestrial Television and establishes 31 August 2023 as the deadline for television broadcasting service concessionaires to proceed with the analog switch-off. 31 December 2023 is the deadline for the digital switch-on. The approved standard for DTT in the country is ATSC 1.0.
Indotel plans to hold a tender to acquire 450,000 converter boxes for digital signal to be made available to vulnerable households in the country that have yet to buy smart TVs. The beneficiaries are those that are not subscribed to cable, satellite or online services.
This process is part of the Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) implementation project, which had been postponed for more than a decade.
With the start of digital broadcasting, users will be able to enjoy high definition images and higher quality audio.
The ATSC standard replaces the analog NTSC standard. The ATSC standard is used mostly in the United States, Mexico, Canada, and South Korea.
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Indotel
15 August 2022