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In an opening keynote, VW Group’s Head of Entertainment & Car Functions Martin Koch, affirmed that radio in the car is important not just for listeners and broadcasters, but also to car manufacturers, with their customers’ demand for broadcast radio in the car is as high as ever, and radio still taking the major share of ear in the car.

The Australian commercial radio industry has joined a global working group of broadcasters, carmakers and tech experts collaborating on the innovation of radio in Android Automotive, Google’s infotainment operating system being built into new connected cars. Speaking at the WorldDAB Automotive 2021 virtual conference Ms Warner said it was important that broadcast technology remains the foundation of delivering radio in the connected car because of its reliability, with internet providing enhanced features such as richer content, images such as album artwork and interactivity.

The EBU Connected Cars and Devices group is looking at the car industry and is in close touch with many car producers in Europe, studying the best ways for standardizing the radio entertainment system option for the European market. Work is also being done in the area of voice-activated devices. Radio is not under threat but we need to be innovate how radio is distributed in the connected dashboard to ensure it remains an attractive service and that it utilizes all the possibilities that connection offers.

A record-breaking 500+ delegates from over 70 countries registered to attend this live event, unique in bringing together the broadcast and automotive sectors to collaborate on securing the future of digital radio in the car. Radio industry leaders Joan Warner from CRA Australia, Antonio Arcidiacono from EBU and Caroline Beasley from the US were unanimous in their message: broadcasters need to work together through their industry bodies to optimise the in-car radio experience to ensure that radio remains prominent and easily discoverable in the car.

In the second half of 2020, more than 80% of new cars in the main European markets were equipped with a DAB+ receiver as standard.

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Paneda and its exclusive partner Agile Broadcast have completed the supply and commissioning of Paneda DAB+ headend software and hardware to Telstra Broadcast Services (TBS), facilitating a highly reliable and redundant DAB+ Broadcast System.

In the last six months of 2020, 333,000 DAB+ radios were sold in The Netherlands. As a result, the counter stands at 2.527 million DAB+ receivers. The number of cars with standard DAB+ on board also grew.

The number of DAB+ receivers sold increased by 140% year-on-year, GfK reported. "We have launched a massive campaign to promote digital radio broadcasting, which has affected millions of people. Sales data clearly show not only the growth of everything digital but also the jump in DAB+ radio sales in the Czech Republic, which follows the trend of other countries where DAB+ is established," says René Zavoral, CEO of Czech Radio.

In the second half of 2020, over 80% of new cars in key European markets came with DAB+ radio as standard - a dramatic increase on the same period in 2019. This step-change reflects the impact of the European Electronic Communications Code (EECC), which, from December 2020, requires all new car radios in the EU to be capable of receiving digital terrestrial radio.