Didja Launches ‘SoCalBTV’ In Los Angeles

Didja, a technology company dedicated to augmenting the broadcast television experience, has expanded its live streaming app, LocalBTV, to the Los Angeles television market. “SoCalBTV” will now offer access to local TV programming via the SoCalBTV mobile app to consumers in the greater Los Angeles region, including the counties of Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Orange, Inyo, Riverside, Kern and Ventura.

SoCalBTV will serve more than 5.5 million households in the southern California region. With 34 channels at launch and more expected in the future, SoCalBTV is focused on bringing diverse local content to Los Angeles area viewers. By allowing TV stations to be accessed by mobile devices, this means even non-antenna households can easily enjoy local broadcast news and entertainment programming anywhere they are in the market.

As a result, previously unavailable local television programming, such as that from the many stations and independent channels not carried by major cable providers or streaming services, can now be viewed by a wider audience.

According to Didja, there are more than 20 million U.S. homes that watch antenna TV, with another 10 million or so without any convenient way to watch local broadcast TV. SoCalBTV will enable more non cable-bundle homes to watch quality antenna TV, thereby strengthening the reach and impact of local media.  

“We are excited to get started in L.A., particularly since our initial effort is partially focused on the bilingual household market which LA has in abundance” said Jim Long, CEO of Didja. “Our pilot launches in Phoenix and the Bay Area have shown that local channels get a nice boost from our service and, better yet, we are attracting younger viewers to antenna TV thus we are confident that customers in the LA market will discover lots of new local programing as they use SoCalBTV.”

“Many of our viewers are members of Southern California’s Asian communities, and they depend on us to for news and entertainment programming in their native language,” said Dennis J. Davis, general manager of NRJ Television Stations in Southern California, consisting of three stations in the Los Angeles area. “SoCalBTV offers access to our channels on smartphones, which are increasingly used to watch TV by people of all cultures. This method of program delivery helps us reach our audience anywhere they are in the Los Angeles DMA.”

In December, Didja secured a total of $12 million in funding led by the private equity investment group Vestech Partners and used the funds to support the expansion of the company’s original LocalBTV app. Next markets for Didja are cities including Houston, Chicago, Washington and New York City, which are projected to launch later this year. LocalBTV is helping local broadcasters evolve as consumers watch TV via streaming apps and on connected devices.

With channels like Skylink, Azteca, KDOC Los Angeles and LSTV, SoCalBTV has a  particular appeal to bilingual audiences in the Hispanic, Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese communities, as it allows access to local news in their native languages. SoCalBTV helps communities that rely on antenna TV to stream those stations via the app in their desired language. As a result, a wider audience has access to previously unavailable local television programming, including many that are not carried by cable or satellite systems or other streaming services. Didja says it is committed to “adding all local broadcast channels to LocalBTV in all our markets.”

The SoCalBTV app is available in the iTunes store here and Google Play store here.