Digital radio momentum driving upwards

David Swan
Tuesday, 07 June 2011 13:50

Your IT - Entertainment

Digital radio has had a slow start but seems to be picking up pace, if recent Sydney and Melbourne automotive workshops are anything to go by.

Vehicle product managers, engineering planning teams, industry association members, retailers and manufacturers attended the workshops to hear from the radio industry on the status of digital radio in Australia and the progress towards the rollout of digital radio in regional Australia.

Chief executive officer of Commercial Radio Australia, Joan Warner said; 'Ultimately, the radio industry objective is to have every car sold in Australia factory fitted with a digital radio. We're very pleased with the response from the automotive industry to our workshops and look forward to continued communication.'

BMW was the first manufacturer in Australia to announce they would be including DAB+ digital radio as an option.

Internationally, 100 delegates from 65 different companies, including leading car manufacturers Audi, BMW, Honda, Skoda, Hyundai, VW, Daimler and Lotus, attended a workshop held last week in Berlin by WorldDMB. A similar system to Australia is being considered in Europe that would be a pan - European standard of DAB, DAB+, DMB. The DAB+ standard in those vehicles would then function in Australia as well.

Integrating digital radio into vehicles, both in Australia and internationally, will enable the delivery of real-time traffic updates. Radio stations could broadcast text based traffic messages or images to deliver traffic flow information snapshots directly to motorists' digital radios and in the future add information about road works, fuel prices and parking station capacities.

The Sydney and Melbourne workshops outlined the digital radio options available to the 16 million already registered vehicles in Australia, including a self or custom fit car adaptor like the Pure Highway or one of a number of the aftermarket products on the market; the Orion, Bluestate, Crystal, JVC and Kenwood.

 

Digital radios sold 38,950 units in Q3 2009 at launch, but managed 120,749 units in Q4 2010, with the number set to rise further if the trends continue as expected.