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GatesAir has helped a Swiss scout project to run an amateur radio station. Part of the 2022 Mova/BuLa Federal Scout Camp, which drew 30,000 boys and girls to an elaborate camping site in the Alps town of Goms, Valais, Switzerland, involved building and operating an amateur radio station. The project — Radio Sonar — used a low-power GatesAir Maxiva transmitter to broadcast live DAB+ radio coverage of Mova/BuLa events.

The latest GfK Survey 8 revealed a record 12.2 million people listened to commercial radio each week. This was the ninth consecutive rise in cumulative audience growth. The number of people listening to commercial radio via streaming soared by 46%, to close to 3.7 million#. Commercial DAB+ station listeners also increased 18.5% YOY to over 2.7 million*. Time spent listening to commercial radio increased across all demographics under 55^. On average, young Australians aged 10-24, tuned in an extra 1 hour and 48 minutes each week across the five major metro markets, bringing their total average listening to 10 hours and 54 mins.

The Norwegian Communications Authority (Nkom) reports several inquiries from consumers who state that so-called emergency radios or emergency radios are being sold that do not meet the requirements that have been set. If you find a radio dealer or an advertisement that says that an FM radio is a full-fledged emergency radio, this is not correct. A good emergency radio has DAB+ technology, and can be used both on 230V and on batteries. That's what department director at Nkom, John-Eivind Velure, says. He further emphasises: — In Norway, NRK P1 is responsible for broadcasting important messages to the population in a crisis situation. They can break in with important messages on all channels, so it doesn't matter if you listen to P13 or P1+. Local FM networks are only an addition that can be used if other mobile radio and TV networks are down. Nkom has notified the Norwegian Consumer Protection Authority and asked them to consider examining the sales communication for products sold as emergency radios.

New opportunities and new audiences with DAB+ was the title of WorldDAB’s briefing at IBC2022 in Amsterdam in September. Developments in the automotive sector, including the importance of metadata, were the focus of the first half of the session, followed by the global growth in small-scale DAB.

On 14 December, the Government approved a draft on the establishment of radio spectrum resources available for the implementation of digital terrestrial broadcasting multiplexes. The objective of the project is to allocate additional radio spectrum resources, which will be made available to audiovisual media service providers and will enable the successful implementation of T-DAB/T-DAB+ digital terrestrial sound broadcasting technologies in the 174-230 MHz band in the country. The radio spectrum resources available to the Republic of Moldova are sufficient for the implementation of 2-6 national multiplexes that can provide national coverage for 30-90 radio stations, compared to 4-5 existing national broadcasters at the moment.

Listeners throughout Germany are increasingly opting for DAB+ digital radio. All the key figures for the current year demonstrate the growing popularity of digital radio reception: in household equipment with DAB+ devices, in the growing variety of stations offered and in the use of radio via DAB+. Radio listening remains in vogue and the use of DAB+ stations is growing, reports the market research institute agma. In the widest listener group, DAB+ now has a share of 27.0 percent (listeners aged 14 and over, ma 2022 Audio I: 24.5 percent). In the previous year, the share was just over 20 per cent.

When ‘Diddy" David Hamilton and Pete Murray appear on their Boom Radio Christmas special this Boxing Day, the veteran broadcasters will have a combined age of 181 and many decades of experience behind them. But becoming the oldest radio duo in history, while a nice footnote for the record books, is very much par for the course for Boom, which has carved out an enviable talent roster and listener base in less than two years. Veteran producers David Lloyd and Phil Riley launched the station – firmly aimed at the over-50s – in February last year with modest ambitions. “The original plan was to carry it on digital radio in London first and, if that worked, then we would think about rolling it out nationally,” says David, 61. Fast forward to today and Boom is, well, booming. Officially Britain’s fastest growing radio station with 443,000 listeners, it’s also rapidly becoming a home for established – read, older – DJs looking to return to their roots.

Südwestrundfunk (SWR) continues to expand its transmitter network for DAB+ digital radio reception in Rhineland-Palatinate. In the northern part of Rhineland-Palatinate and on the Middle Moselle, there will be a wide variety of programmes in future thanks to the DAB+ commissioning of the Traben-Trarbach and Mudersbach sites.

Rivierenland Radio is further expanding its reach via DAB+. The radio station can now also be heard in the Apeldoorn and Achterhoek region on DAB+ via channels 6B and 6D. On Rivierenland Radio, you will hear a mix of music from the '70s to contemporary hits. Since December last year, the radio station can already be heard in parts of North Brabant via DAB+ on channels 7B and 6A.

The draft of the Guidelines for DAB tenders, i.e. the selection procedures for the assignment of rights of use for planned networks in local catchment areas to digital network operators for radio broadcasting, has been published by the Ministry of Enterprise and Industry. On the merits, the adoption of the Resolution, approved the "Provisional National Plan for the Assignment of the Frequencies in the VHF band - III for the DAB+ digital radio broadcasting service (PNAF-DAB)", thus creating the necessary prerequisite for the Ministry to proceed with the granting of the rights of use on the networks planned by AGCOM.