News

The Flemish Regulator for Media (VRM) has approved all five submitted local DAB+ pilot projects. After payment of the broadcasting licence fee (100 euros per broadcasting location), VRM issues the licences. They will come into effect on 1 February and will be valid for a year, and may be extended pending the final frequency plan for local DAB+. A total of 63 local radios will participate.

Oldie Antenne, previously a web radio station from Antenne Bayern "Antenna Bayern Oldies but Goldies", has announced its launch date via DAB+ digital radio. The new station will be available via DAB+ in Hamburg, North Rhine-Westphalia and Saarland from February 1, 2022, according to the station's website.

The DAB+ offer is growing continuously in Germany. There are now 300 DAB+ programmes that can be received in different regions, 100 of them exclusively via DAB+. Details on the continued growth is reported by the Digitalradio Büro Deutschland, with new developments having taken place in the north, middle and south of the country. Full information can be found at www.dabplus.de.

A new radio station playing nothing but live performances has launched on DAB. Arena Radio’s plan is to expand through DAB digital broadcasting and it has already started airing on DAB in Cambridge with more areas to come in the next few weeks. The station says talks are taking place with concert promoters and venues about sponsorship.

Launched at the end of 2020, the WorldDAB Asia-Pacific Technical Group concluded the year by holding its 4th meeting on 9th December. Throughout 2021 the WorldDAB APAC Technical Group grew from strength to strength, with membership of the group growing to over 60 radio industry representatives from over 20 countries from across the region, and with virtually all Southeast Asian countries being represented. The meetings focused a range of topics around the “DAB adoption process” covering topics from Trials and Experimentation to DAB requirements and Allotment planning.

Two new regular digital radio multiplexes launched by PSN Infrastruktura have started in Toruń and Rzeszów, both offering five local DAB+ radio stations. A third multiplex was launched by Dabcom in Tarnów, with initially five local radio stations, and a sixth one to join soon. Further local multiplexes will also be launched soon in Poznań, Warsaw, Katowice and Częstochowa.

A recent study shows that by purely broadcasting on DAB+, Bayerischer Rundfunk could save two million kilowatt hours. In Germany, on average this is a CO2 saving of 856 tons. The transmission of a single BR program only consumes 26% of the energy of a program broadcast on VHF.

Hopes are high that the National Broadcasting Council may announce in January the competition for broadcasting licences on the nationwide DAB+ MUX . Leading commercial broadcasters are sceptical, and remain silent. Prof. Janusz Kawecki from the National Broadcasting Council in an interview with Wirtualnemedia.pl, however, does not hide his optimism.

Since 10 January Austria's DAB+ multiplex includes a programme specifically for Vienna from radio station Welle 1, which up to now had been broadcasting only a unified version of their programme for Austria. The purely Viennese version of Welle 1 starts exactly one year after the programme joined the DAB+ Austria multiplex, and allows the station operator to better target the programme to metropolitan listeners.

lulu.fm starts on Saturday, January 15, 2022 in Vienna on DAB+ digital radio, reaching more than 3 million inhabitants in the greater Vienna area. The new radio station ensures audibility and visibility within the Austrian radio landscape of the LGBTIQ community it serves.