Broadcasting (Apr - June 1960)

■ Rep appointments ■ KPAM Portland, Ore., KALE Richland, Wash., and KXIV Phoenix: Weed Radio Corp., N.Y. ■ WAMV-AM-FM St. Louis: Good Music Broadcasters Inc., N.Y. ■ KTBS-TV Shreveport, La. : The Katz Agency, N.Y. ■ KVEN Ventura, Calif.: John E. Pearson Co. as national representative. ■ KCOK Tulare, Calif.: B-N-B Time Sales, L.A. ■ WAND Canton, Ohio; WAJR Morgantown, W. Va.; WJER Dover, Ohio7 and WJKE Pittsburgh, all Greer stations: Walker-Rawalt Co., N.Y. ■ WCCC Hartford, Conn.: Gill-Perna Inc. as national representative and Foster & Creed Inc. for New England. EQUIPMENT & ENGINEERING TV SET SALES LOOKING BRIGHTER With improvements & 23" tube, sales may jump 1 7%, EIA notes Tv receiver sales for the next 12 months — sparked by 23-in. picture tube and other technical improvements — are expected to be 17% above comparable 1959 sales, an Electronic Industries Assn, official said last week. Marion E. Pettegrew, senior vice president of Sylvania home electronics division and chairman of the EIA consumer products division, said tv set sales in the next fiscal year should reach 6.1 million. He also estimated that radio set sales should be 9.3 million, auto radios 6.5 million and phonographs 4.7 million. In submitting his report to the EIA board at the annual convention in Chicago, Mr. Pettegrew also noted that there was underway a “sharp shift” in phonograph sales from monaural to stereo. He said, too, that color tv had won a few additional manufacturer promoters. Although these were not identified, Mr. Pettegrew presumably was referring to Admiral, Motorola and Packard-Bell having joined RCA in recent months in manufacturing and promoting color receivers. Motorola, however, has ceased its color manufacture. Opposes Legislation ■ Mr. Pettegrew reported his committee’s opposition to the FCC-sponsored Congressional legislation which would require that tv receivers be capable of receiving all bands allocated for tv broadcasting. This means vhf-uhf sets. “The committee felt that legislation should not be used to force consumers to pay more for tv sets regardless of whether they have uhf stations in their areas,” Mr. Pettegrew said. The EIA meeting spent most of its time on such problems as military electronics ($4.7 billion factory sales in 1960), Japanese imports and minimum wage laws. The association presented its medal of honor to David R. Hull, Raytheon vice president, who completed two terms as EIA president. He is being succeeded by L. Berkley Davis, GE vice president (see At Deadline). Mr. Hull predicted that the electronic industry would be operating at 68 an annual level of $20 billion by 1970 — twice the current rate of sales. Mr. Hull touched on the Japanese import problem in his report at the annual membership luncheon May 19. Japan sells more than half of the transistor portable radios bought in the U.S., he said. He referred to an investigation now underway by the Office of Civil & Defense Mobilization to determine if Japanese imports — which include components as well as radios — threaten U.S. electronics firms to the degree that national defense is weakened. He said that Japan’s recent cessation of licensing of transistor radio shipments to the U.S. might indicate GE tube, Japanese General Electric’s new image orthicon camera tube, designed to eliminate browning at the edges of tv pictures, emerged as one of the highlights of the Chicago Electronics Parts Show last week. High on the interest list also was the first showing of a Japanese color receiver. This was the 21 -in. Hitachi receiver, shown by Sampson Co., Chicago distributor. The all-industry exposition, co-sponsored by Electronic Industries Assn, and other groups, drew approximately 15,000 visitors May 16-18. Over 300 manufacturers exhibited radio-tv and high fidelity parts and components to How it works ■ Here’s how the new GE camera tube clears up the screen. The pronounced portholing and poor edge resolution shown in the right test that Japan was preparing to impose a voluntary quota on such exports. Other highlights of the 350-member association convention: ■ The number of electronic companies experiencing financial difficulties rose in the 12-month period ending March 31 by 15% over the same 1958-59 period. Only one radio-tv manufacturer was involved in economic distress, the credit committee reported. ■ Publication of an educational tv guidebook is underway, the educational ! coordinating committee reported. The guide will cover present and future status of etv and is aimed primarily at school administrators. color set are shown distributors, sales representatives and the trade. GE’s new field mesh tube (GL-7293) | cures “port-holing” and “edge effects” I by minimizing darkness and distortion at the sides and corners of the screen, it was claimed. The tube, GE said, is < <; interchangeable with the standard image orthicons currently used in television studio camera. The Hitachi color receiver is fully compatible with American telecasting standards, it was said. The set (CT-150) uses 28 tubes, six diodes and one fullwave silicon rectifier. No price was j placed on the receiver. pattern is taken with standard image orthicon; the test pattern at the left shows the same shot with the new GE field mesh I.O. BROADCASTING, May 23, 1960