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The performance of the digital radio business has been buoyed by strong international developments. Norway became the first country in the world to confirm a date (2017) for Digital Switchover.

"DAB+ offers the consumers a real added value: listeners who use the digital broadcast standard, have benefited from a better reception, additional information and additional pictures." says Ralf Reynolds, Chief of PURE Germany.

In Vienna, the DAB+ trial will include 17 stations. The official transmission for Vienna digital radio is 28 May.

Using examples from Australia and South Africa, he highlighted the flexibility of digital radio for allowing pop up stations such as special events and festival stations that appear for a few weeks at a time on the digital dial.

The coverage of the DAB+ network in Germany will be significantly expanded over the next eighteen months.

Digital radio has reached a turning point in Europe. The first countries have decided a date for change and many others have politically backed digital radio.

On June 11, several of Europe's leading radio operators will gather in Oslo to discuss the future of radio. Representatives of the radio industry in the Netherlands, Belgium and Poland will also give presentations on challenges and initiatives in their home countries.

However, DAB digital radio - through a box that looks like a typical radio - is 25.9% of all radio listening; and it grew by 9.3% year-on-year.

Strong growth for DAB to 25.9 percent (up 9.3 percent) and internet/apps to 6.8 percent (up 6.3 percent). Nearly half of all UK households (49 percent) now have a digital radio set. Digital listening in car grows 52 percent, to 16 percent of hours in-car.

Hossein Yassaie is CEO of Imagination Technologies, and he has been head of the graphics company for quite some time – since 1998, in fact. Yassaie also kicked off the firm's Pure division when he saw a gap in the digital radio market, and while the initial intention might not have been to shift products to consumers – the first radio was really meant as a demo platform for Pure's DAB chip – success quickly led to a range of DAB radios (like the Evoke), portable wireless speakers, iPhone docks and the like.