Thomas Gibbon

Thomas Gibbon now concentrates his practice in global media communications. He has been outside counsel to NHK Japan Broadcasting Corporation and several of NHK’s affiliated companies for over 30 years. He is counsel to NHK’s flagship international English language channel, NHK WORLD-JAPAN, and has been closely involved with all of the international cable/DTH/IPTV distribution agreements that have permitted the channel to be distributed in over 160 countries, reaching 300 million TV households. He advises NHK with respect to the construction of NHK’s global contribution network to bring video feeds into Tokyo from all over the world. He assists NHK in developing its worldwide backbone distribution network on international satellites, including NHK’s NexGen satellite project that distributes NHK’s international channels in MPEG-4 HD worldwide. He negotiates affiliate agreements with all the major DTH, cable and IPTV companies in the U.S. for the distribution of the Japanese language channel, TV JAPAN.

On behalf of NHK, Mr. Gibbon is active in the World Broadcasting Union - International Media Connections Group (WBU-IMCG). At WBU-IMCG forums he has moderated panels of technical experts on such topics as High Dynamic Range video and Over the Top Television. He is past Chair of the MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 Codec HDTV Contribution Codec Interoperability Programs of WBU-IMCG. This project brought together the major international broadcasters, satellite providers and codec vendors to make the transmission of MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 HDTV video feeds more efficient. He recently completed a similar interoperability project for HEVC (H.265) 4K encoders/decoders.

In 2016, Mr. Gibbon was a guest lecturer at Sophia University in Tokyo where he presented "Trends in Global Media".

Thomas Gibbon has over 30 years’ experience in the communications industry. Before forming his own firm, he was chair of the Bell Boyd & Lloyd Communications Law Group. Earlier in his career, he was staff counsel in communications matters for the Maine Public Utilities Commission, where he litigated telephone cases before the Commission and Maine Supreme Court. As a member of the Haley Bader and Potts Washington DC firm, he appeared before the FCC and various federal courts on behalf of MCI, the phone company that broke the ATT monopoly. He served as outside counsel to the District of Columbia Public Service Commission with respect to telephone proceedings and implementation of the 1996 Telecommunications Act.

Mr. Gibbon has significant litigation experience in non-communications cases, including numerous ADEA and ERISA termination and benefit reductions cases in federal courts. He has served as counsel in many commercial litigation cases in federal and state courts including commercial and government contract cases.

His prior public service also includes his employment at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission as counsel to Commissioner Peter Bradford.

Education

• B.A. Bucknell University, 1970
• J.D. University of Maine School of Law, 1974

Admissions

• District of Columbia
• Maine (Inactive)
• U.S. District Court, District of Columbia
• U.S. District Court, District of Maine
• U.S. Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit
• U.S. Court of Appeals, 10th Circuit
• U.S. Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit