The Pioneers

The Pioneers Dick Kirsche and Chris Lammers

Richard (Dick) Kirsche

Dick is a retired Electrical Engineer after more than 60 years in the profession.  That career provided him with opportunities to work with several emerging technologies.

Dick graduated from Lehigh University in 1960 with a degree in electrical engineering.  He began his career at ITT Laboratories working on radar systems and satellite earth station terminals that provided the ground communication link for the early communication satellites.  (Telstar, Relay, Syncom, etc.)

Dick transitioned to a position at RCA Astro-electronics after an IT&T reduction in force.  Astro was designing and building several early satellite systems.  Dick’s concentration was the design and qualification for launch of the command receivers that supported ground control commands. 

He continued in the aerospace industry until the mid-1960’s when he joined a startup company designing custom power supplies and a UHF television exciter for a startup transmitter manufacturer. (Townsend Associates)  Dick joined Townsend to head up their transmitter design and production engineering.  Townsend was acquired by Ampex Corporation which expanded their presence in the Broadcast Industry.  When Ampex suffered some financial setbacks related to their music recording business.  The Broadcast transmitter division was shuttered to improve their bottom line. 

In 1972 Dick was part of a group from the closing Ampex transmitter operation that started Spectrum Cable, a company that was seeking cable system franchises in the Western Massachusetts area.  Spectrum was awarded franchises in 3 communities in the suburbs of Springfield, MA.  At that time Cable television was, essentially, a reception service which made operation in city TV markets like Springfield challenging.  Spectrum’s offering to that market was superior reception in addition to 2 channels from the Boston, MA market that provided coverage of major hockey and basketball teams.  Spectrum employed a unique network of cylindrical steel towers, with headend electronics at the top and distant signals shared by microwave.  Shortly after Spectrum began operation Home Box Office was added via regional microwave.   

Spectrum was acquired by Colony Communications in 1975.  Spectrum’s cable systems were combined with 4 cable franchises in the same region operated by Colony.  Dick was hired to head up engineering for that group of cable franchises.  Over time, Dick’s responsibilities expanded to head of engineering for all of Colony’s cable and MDS microwave systems. 

Cable system technology was advancing rapidly during that period.  Channels, received from satellites became common.  Dick worked with the Colony engineering team to install the 2nd 10-meter dia. earth station in the Northeast.  Expansion of cable service channels, from satellite, sparked a rapid growth in public interest in cable TV service.  Colony aggressively supported that expansion of service offerings on their cable systems.  Dick also supported the franchise acquisition team seeking additional cable television communities for Colony. 
Dick left Colony at the end of 1981, joining Greater Media Cable at the start of 1982 as Vice President of Engineering.  Greater Media had a strong presence in New England which was expanded through franchising and acquisitions.  That expansion also included one-fourth of the City of Philadelphia and a complex of systems located in the suburbs of Detroit, MI.  Cable television technology was advancing rapidly during that period as operators continued to improve their service offerings and reliability.   During his employment with Greater Media, that operator became a founding member of CableLabs, deployed a 60 channel AML microwave system for the large Worcester complex of towns, began offering DOCSIS data over cable service, began using fiber optic cable for video distribution, and expanded their local video origination service to a full-time live news service.  Dick was active on SCTE, CableLabs, and NCTA Industry committees for Greater Media. 
The Greater Media cable operations were sold in 1999.  In 2000 Dick joined RCN, a system operator that competed in the Cable space by building their own facilities in parallel with the incumbent cable television provider, as Director of Video technology.  RCN deployed Video on Demand technology and developed a unique set-top box technology designed to give RCN a competitive advantage in the Chicago cable market.   

Dick joined Comcast Cable as a Director in 2005.  Initially, he was part of the team creating a specification for a set-top box design unique to Comcast.  His work continued as part of a small engineering team testing and certifying set-top boxes for deployment to subscribers by Comcast.  His duties also expanded to supporting Comcast’s work to improve the energy efficiency of Comcast devices in subscriber’s homes.  This included active participation in the DOE’s Energy Star program and Cable industry initiatives to address government energy efficiency requirements. 

Mr. Kirsche left Comcast in 2010 and opened Kirsche Consulting LLC.  Kirsche Consulting supported Cable Operators’ set-top and energy efficiency reporting efforts.  That work included considerable recordkeeping and analysis work for Comcast which led to significant energy savings for Comcast subscribers.

Dick officially retired in 2018 but continues to support SCTE standards work as a volunteer.   

Christopher J Lammers, COO Emeritus and Senior Executive Advisor, CableLabs®

Chris is currently coo emeritus and senior executive advisor for CableLabs leading special projects and initiatives, including the integration of SCTE as a key part of CableLabs, together with supporting relationships across industry associations including ACA Connects, The Cable Center, CCSA, the Emma Bowen Foundation, NCTA, NCTC and WICT. Prior to this, Chris served as senior vice president and chief operating officer at CableLabs directing accounting and finance, IT, facilities and membership development. He remains committed to relationships with mid-sized and smaller MSOs, as well as with international cable operators in Asia, Europe and Latin America, key communities he built at CableLabs.

Chris currently serves as a member of the board of directors of The Cable Center and the Emma Bowen Foundation and is actively involved in committees and/or support for several national and international industry trade associations.  He is a member of the Cable TV Pioneers (Class of 2021).

Prior to joining CableLabs in 1997, Chris was president and CEO of Western Communications, a mid-sized multiple system operator with cable systems located in the Western United States. Before that, Chris was a partner with the San Francisco law firm of Cooper, White & Cooper.

Chris received a Juris Doctor degree from the University of Chicago School of Law and a Bachelor of Arts degree with distinction from Stanford University.

Acknowledgments
A special thank you to Benjamin Monlezun for the use of his original song, Downpoor.

The views expressed in this episode are solely those of the podcast host and guests and do not necessarily represent the position, strategy, or opinions of CableLabs.