News

Louis Timpany was 22 and working on a building site when he had a brainwave – a radio station by, and for, tradespeople. Now with a huge listenership, Fix Radio is taking on the big beasts of the airwaves. Fix Radio now reaches a growing audience of more than 400,000 people a week, with an average weekly listening time of more than 26 hours, according to audio-broadcast ratings company Nielsen. New web-based broadcasting technology has lowered the barrier to entry decades after DAB smashed open the limited bandwidth that FM and AM had offered. Niche stations with regional or national audiences have bloomed, and include Radio Maria (a Catholic station), Polish Radio London, Gaydio and Boom Radio, which targets the 60-plus demographic.

The Plzeň-based company RTI cz, which is the only one besides Czech Radio Communications to have won a nationwide multiplex in the frequency auction, will share sites for DAB+ signal distribution. The second national network for digital radio - a competitor to the Czech Radio multiplex - will largely depend on sharing transmission sites with other radio multiplex operators. RTI cz, which auctioned the Czech Telecommunications Office's C network covering the whole Czech Republic, does not expect to build new transmitters for it. It operates masts in western and southern Bohemia but does not plan to build any more. Václav Ježek, managing director and owner of RTI cz, told the media.

Delta Média, publisher of the Delta FM and Delta+ radio stations, is continuing its terrestrial development by adding a new transmission site to its DAB+ network. DAB+ is FM radio made even better! With HD quality, you can receive more programmes free of charge and enjoy better territorial coverage. Delta Média was a pioneer in DAB+, offering its programmes in HD in Dunkirk, Calais and Lille from 2018. This was followed by Boulogne in 2021 and St Omer in 2023. Now, towns in the Berck, Montreuil and Le Touquet area can receive our two stations on radios and car radios equipped with the DAB+ standard.

The nationwide commercial radio DAB+ multiplex is to replicate the public network CRo DAB+, whose broadcasts are managed by Radiokomunikace, the main operator in the country. The largest Czech cities, such as Prague, Ostrava and Plzeň, are targets for coverage by České Radiokomunikace in the first phase of the construction of their national digital radio network auctioned by the telecommunications authority. It is the nationwide network B, which they acquired together with three other regional networks, that they want to start building the infrastructure for commercial digital broadcasting. As Marcel Procházka, director of the regulation and legal department of Czech Radio, told Médiáři, the company plans to launch the first transmitters in the third quarter of this year.

The wireless solution providers UPLINK Network GmbH, Düsseldorf (UPLINK Group) and DIVICON MEDIA HOLDING GmbH, Leipzig, have announced their merger. The merger of the two companies, which are leaders in German broadcasting operations for FM and DAB+, is intended to create a broad basis for the foreseeable medium and long-term challenges facing the radio industry. Together, over 1,200 FM transmitters, 9 DAB+ multiplexes with a total of 70 DAB+ transmitters and various other radio solutions such as Private 5G, LoRaWan and a dedicated data centre at the German internet hub in Frankfurt will be operated at more than 700 locations.

Following the well-received event in spring 2022, the next edition of "DAB+ in Dialogue" will take place in Berlin on 27 June 2024. For the fifth edition of the successful networking event with stakeholders from politics, business and programme providers, we invite you to the Representation of the State of Schleswig-Holstein to the Federal Government: Together with you in dialogue for a successful future of digital terrestrial broadcasting DAB+. Around 150 guests from industry, politics and business as well as representatives of programme providers and network operators will find out about the development of DAB+ in workshops and panel discussions.

The experimental installations of the Digital Radio Group consortium – DRG DAB continue. After Rome it is the turn of Milan, activated in the city centre from the Via Turati site. The transmitter operates on channel 9C on the 206.352 MHz frequency with service in Milan and the province and will soon be followed by transmitters on the same channel for the provinces of Brescia and Bergamo. DRG DAB, a multi-regional consortium of local radio broadcasters, has presented the expression of interest to the Ministry of Business and Made in Italy for the assignment of rights of use for the DAB+ operator for the Lombardy Basin n.3. This request is in addition to those of Lazio, Sardinia and Sicily already being evaluated by Mimit.

The Chairman of the Council of the ČTÚ has already decided on the allocation of radio frequencies under Section 22 of the Electronic Communications Act for all eight entities that were successful in the tender for the granting of rights to use radio frequencies in the 174-230MHz band. Within one month of the end of the selection procedure and the award of radio frequency allocations to all winners of the auction, the Office will publish a report on the procedure and the results of the auction. Within the same time limit, the Authority will also publish a complete record of the auction made by the electronic auction system. The total auctioned price for all Auction Blocks was 79 325 000 CZK (€3.1m).

Gorka Zumeta writes: DAB+ is here, now what? In the following lines, we analyse the reality surrounding DAB+ in Spain. Radio Nacional de España announced on 13 February, World Radio Day, that it was launching DAB+ broadcasts in Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Murcia and Bilbao. In principle, only RNE (formerly Radio Uno), Radio 3 and Radio 5 Todo Noticias. Radio Clásica, Ràdio 4 (in Catalonia) and Radio Exterior de España (which does broadcast on DAB) are left out for the time being. Little by little, public radio will gradually bring its digital broadcasts to other cities in Spain, subject to the corresponding announcement. At the same time, the Government of Navarra has granted its first 19 DAB stations with local coverage.

Aeranti-Corallo interviewed Fausta Bergamotto, Under-secretary of State at the Ministry of Enterprise and Made in Italy. "As far as DAB+ is concerned, we are in a challenging transition phase with the national networks coexisting with the experimental licences granted at local level," Bergamotto said. "The allocation phase for local DAB networks is drawing to a close, as is the allocation of rights of use for the national ones, and we are confident that the entire system will soon be able to benefit from the quality and cleanliness of the sound guaranteed by digital. In this sense, too, in the new service contract with RAI, we wanted to emphasise the need for the concessionaire to invest in the network in order to improve its coverage."