By: Jim Thomason.

I’m just thrilled to be joining the Dielectric sales team as the company’s new southeast regional manager. I can’t believe my good fortune. Dielectric has an impeccable industry reputation, great people, awesome products, and promising new marketing opportunities.

Since Dielectric was a key player in the original DTV transition, I believe that U.S. broadcasters will again be relying on Dielectric to get them smoothly through this next period of transition, including the hectic spectrum repack and migration to ATSC 3.0.

Very soon, when broadcasters get their new channel assignments, they will only have 90 days to submit relatively complex paperwork to the FCC that details their transition plans. My goal is to be a responsive resource that gets our customers whatever information and new products they need to ensure that they have the smoothest transition possible.

Over the last 22 years, I’ve focused on transmission equipment sales to regional television and radio stations, for such companies as GatesAir, Harris Communications’ Broadcast Division, Broadcast Electronics and Electronics Research.

Just prior to joining Dielectric, I worked briefly at ESD Waste2Water, in Ocala, Florida, as the regional manager for this industrial water treatment and environmental remediation equipment company. While it was a very interesting job, I didn’t have a true passion for it.

I guess I can say that broadcasting is in my blood. It’s been a life-long passion since my college days as a DJ working for a local commercial radio station, and even before that when I worked as a program director and production director at my high school radio station.

I also spent brief periods of time working for Dielectric on and off over the years, and so when this position came up, I knew it was “preparation meeting opportunity.”  I’m looking forward to providing all types of essential sales and customer service support to broadcasters in the southeast, including my home base of Central Florida, which is often referred to as hurricane central. I’m sure I’ll be the first call our broadcast customers make whenever bad weather strikes their tower sites or other emergency situations. For me, keeping broadcasters in the southeast up and running and helping them move seamlessly throughout the spectrum repack and ATSC 3.0 transitions will be my top priorities.