News

The second session in today’s ABU-Rai Days conference was titled Showcasing a sustainable media industry and explored how some major broadcasters in Europe and Asia Pacific have taken up challenges of making their organisations and activities more sustainable. ABC Radio Sydney Manager, Steve Ahern is Chairman of the Green Ears project in Australia, which focuses on sustainability in the radio and audio industries. He outlined the commitment of all Australian audio broadcasters to support increased sustainable practices through this initiative. Transmissions is generally the largest contributor to emissions (Broadcast and Streaming) however Digital (DAB+) transmission significantly reduces power usage with its multiple shared services on one transmitter.

Leicester Digital Partnership has switched on the small-scale DAB service for Leicester ahead of an official launch. The multiplex, supported by Maxxwave, was switched on last week and will be officially launching on March 19th 2023. Leicester Digital Partnership is a collaboration between community radio stations in Leicester, with EAVA FM, Kohinoor Radio, LCR2, Radio2Funky and Takeover Radio operating the licence on a not-for-profit basis. Dr Rob Watson, Managing Director of Leicester Digital Partnership said: “As a round three licence award we are very pleased that Maxxwave has commissioned our broadcast service so quickly and with such a cost-effective approach that will make this service sustainable."

There will be a change in the state-wide DAB+ multiplex in Saarland on channel 9C. The Media Council of the Saarland State Media Authority has already approved the plan to replace the slot of the radio station "nice" with "Trigger.FM". Like "nice", "Trigger.FM" is a 24-hour radio station, aimed at German-speaking people in the EU who are mainly interested in cars, boats, outdoor activities and rock'n'roll music.

The 2024 Ford Mustang is the next car to lose AM radio. "A majority of U.S. AM stations, as well as a number of countries and automakers globally, are modernising radio by offering internet streaming through mobile apps, FM, digital and satellite radio options. Ford will continue to offer these alternatives for customers to hear their favorite AM radio music, news and podcasts as we remove amplitude modulation—the definition of AM in this case—from most new and updated models we bring to market," wrote a Ford spokesperson.

The Bayerische Landeszentrale für neue Medien / Bavarian State Center for New Media (BLM) has announced that the invitation to tender for the allocation of digital terrestrial transmission capacities in the Oberpfalz DAB coverage area is now available for download. The invitation to tender ends on 11.04.2023.

Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union’s Digital Broadcasting Symposium returned as an in-person event after a two-year pandemic induced hiatus. “Nothing can actually take the place of a good face-to-face conversation,” said ABU Secretary General Dr Javad Mottaghi, in his opening address to the 2023 Digital Broadcasting Symposium in Kuala Lumpur. Lindsay Cornell, Principal Systems Architect at BBC Digital delivered an update on DAB+, saying for broadcasters this technology offers multiple opportunities to innovate, allowing more operators to be present in the same spectrum. “By running the same content through all the outlets, revenue increased far more than operation costs.” “Opportunities aren’t all about increasing revenue; DAB is the most energy efficient of all the means of delivering digital content.”

From 8 March, the RadioDNS system has been part of the Czech Radio broadcasts, which, among other things, will enable the connection of a given station with its presentation on the internet. Technically, all stations of the public service broadcaster on FM and DAB+ are now connected with web services such as audio streams, station logos, etc. "The RadioDNS system enables Czech Radio to optimally connect all three of our key distribution platforms, i.e. FM, DAB and the internet. This is a modern solution for hybrid radio," says Karel Zýka, Director of Technology and Administration at Czech Radio.

GatesAir, a Thomson Broadcast subsidiary dedicated to wireless content delivery, enters its second century in business with new over-the-air broadcast innovations on the horizon for NAB Show 2023. The second generation of GatesAir’s Maxiva MultiD series of multichannel DAB/DAB+ radio transmitters is first out of the gate, unleashing new benefits such as improved power and bandwidth management, connectivity, and monitoring and control functionality. The MultiD Series comes from the clever engineering minds of the GatesAir Europe team, which developed the series to reduce the costs and infrastructure of per-site multichannel DAB broadcasting.

The Occitanie region has been covered by the DAB+ radio network for several weeks now. This technology offers better sound quality, simplifies the search for stations and avoids interruptions in the car. It is also more environmentally friendly than the traditional FM band. "This is the first time in a long time that we have had space on the broadcasting bands," smiles Arcom's Hervé Godechot.

There has never been more radio in North Rhine-Westphalia. Now the next market expansion is on the horizon: The State Media Authority NRW is preparing the tender for an additional state-wide, regionalised DAB+ multiplex ("DAB+-Regio"). And you can help us to adapt this tender as well as possible to the needs of your industry. All radio broadcasters who are interested in broadcasting one or more radio stations via DAB+ in North Rhine-Westphalia are now invited to participate in Medienanstalt NRW's Call for Interest. The DAB+ Regio call for tender is planned for the fourth quarter of 2023.