News

On 1 January 2025, a new era in Swiss radio history will begin: SRG's public radio stations will then broadcast exclusively digitally (RADIOSZENE reported). Analogue broadcasting via FM will be discontinued in favour of digital antenna radio DAB+ and IP. The private broadcasters will follow, with the last FM providers switching by the end of 2026. Anyone who listens to the radio in Switzerland today - be it news, music, weather forecasts or traffic reports - usually uses DAB+ or the internet (IP). Only ten per cent of the public still receive radio exclusively via FM.

Radio WoW celebrates its fifth anniversary, marking an important milestone in the world of FM and digital radio. Born in the north-east of Italy, the station has been able to expand rapidly thanks to its DAB coverage, reaching Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna and Trentino-Alto Adige. Mattia Comin, publisher of the Sphera Holding Group, expresses great satisfaction: ‘We are very pleased to have achieved the set targets, with almost 100,000 listeners on the average day and excellent results also in AQH, in difficult targets such as millennials and Gen Z. The Radio WoW project has also rejuvenated the group's audience, bringing great energy to the live events.’

Bayerischer Rundfunk is now also broadcasting its DAB+ service from the Fürstenfeldbruck (Schöngeising) transmitter site in Upper Bavaria. The new transmitter significantly improves DAB+ reception in the town of Fürstenfeldbruck and in large parts of the district. In Lower Bavaria, the DAB+ transmitter Oberfrauenwald will go into regular operation on 23 October: The transmitter covers the eastern parts of the districts of Passau and Freyung-Grafenau. Ten BR programmes and many private radio stations can be received with a DAB+ radio. The Bavaria-wide DAB+ transmitter network thus grows to 90 locations.

The Media Council of the Berlin/Brandenburg Media Authority has approved numerous extensions of licences and allocations for non-commercial broadcasters. These include Freies BürgerRadio Slubfurt e.V.; Radio Netzwerk Berlin e.V.; and Freie Radios Berlin Brandenburg e.V.. Also, DAB+ capacity on channel 7D and the Berlin FM frequency 91.0 MHz will be made available for the open channel ‘ALEX Berlin’ until 31 December 2025.

Global is removing LBC News from 1152 kHz AM in London. Audio running on the frequency says the service will cease on medium wave at the end of October, advising listeners to retune to DAB or online. The promo says: “From later this month the way you listen to LBC News might change. From the end of October LBC News will no longer be available on AM radio across London. To continue listening in this area you might need to retune your radio. You can keep listening on DAB digital radio, on Global Player, or by asking your smart speaker to play LBC News.” LBC News will continue on national DAB via Digital One.

At its meeting on 17 October, the Media Council of the Bavarian Regulatory Authority for New Media (BLM) approved the broadcasting of Absolut Radio AI by Antenne Deutschland GmbH & Co. KG to broadcast the Absolut Radio AI programme. This is the first ever case of approval for a national radio station designed and presented by artificial intelligence (AI). The regional centre is responsible, as Antenne Deutschland is based in Garching near Munich. ‘kAI’, an artificial intelligence, hosts the programme 24 hours a day. Since August 2024, he has been supported by the presenter ‘AIleen’, an AI with a female voice. The slogan ‘Absolut Radio AI - artificial intelligence presents here’ is clearly audibly broadcast. The station has been broadcast regionally via DAB+ in the Braunschweig area since the end of August 2023.

Since 1 October, 13 new radio stations have been broadcasting on DAB+ in Lens and the surrounding area. With the agreement of Arcom, this new transmitter was installed on the initiative of the 13 stations that make up the local multiplex known as ‘BLAD’ (Béthune, Lens, Arras, Douai).

MIMIT has convened, for the next few days, the new public sessions (the second, after those held in September) for the assignment in some regions of the rights of use of frequencies to network operators for the digital terrestrial radio broadcasting service on certain DAB+ digital radio frequencies. These meetings in public session concern cases where there have been several expressions of interest for the same frequency and, as provided for in the calls for tenders, are intended to verify the possibility of reaching an agreement in relation to the choice of the network.

In North Rhine-Westphalia, the largest mutual agreement procedure begins on Tuesday afternoon (15 October), probably not only in the history of the federal state, but nationwide. Applicants for five regional DAB+ multiplexes will meet via video conference, including 41 local radio stations, seven regional and two new state-wide stations, Radio NRW as the framework programme provider for all NRW local radio stations, as well as four applicants for platform operation. Representatives of the local radio stations' operating companies will also have the right to speak, as by law they are responsible for programme distribution in the two-pillar model. 55 applicants must agree on a single solution.

Play.cz, which has so far been active mainly in the field of internet streaming, will launch its own radio network in the DAB+ standard in the first quarter of next year. Jan John, a member of the company's supervisory board, made the announcement at the Media and Technology 2024 conference in Pardubice on Tuesday. The network's programming is currently in the pipeline. The launch in the first quarter of next year means that the operator will launch one transmitter in each of the awarded regions. Play.cz wants to proceed in such a way that by the end of 2025 and the beginning of 2026, it will have completed the first phase of expansion, which the Czech Telecommunications Authority set for it as one of the winners of the auction.