Reaching For The Future Means Holding Tight

Michael Hedges December 19, 2013 Follow on Twitter

A digital future has crept up on us. Like the weather there can be no denying. Some changes have come as storms, even tsunamis, lifting media landscapes or inundating them. Policy makers, however, live in the present where the future is always tense.

It came with very little surprise. The UK government has pushed back the possibility of ending FM radio broadcasting until the end of the decade. Communications Minister Ed Vaizey telegraphed the message at the end of November and issued the final word this week.

“I absolutely believe that the future of radio in this country is digital,” said Minister Vaizey at the Go Digital Conference in London, repeating the primary argument of digital radio supporters. “We are not there yet. So now is not the time to switch over.” No firm switch-over date will be set until coverage parity with the FM platform is reached and digital platform listening reaches 50%. At last estimate 35% of national listening hours are digital.

At the beginning of the decade the UK government was ready to shut down the FM radio band by 2015 if those conditions were met. Multiplex operators, the BBC, major commercial broadcasters, receiver manufacturers and chip makers ramped up switch-over marketing. Consumer purchase of digital audio broadcasting (DAB) receivers, predictably, grew steadily, peaked then stalled. Early adopters adopted, digital skeptics resisted. DAB receivers barely penetrated the automobile.

Local UK radio operators have been less than thrilled with digital transition, new multiplex costs being one factor and lower DAB receiver take-up outside major urban centers another. “Ed Vaizey’s announcement is good news for the listener and local commercial radio stations,” said UKRD CEO William Rogers, quoted by Exeter Express & Echo (December 16). “It makes no commitment to force consumers to do something they may not wish to and enables radio operators to plan properly for their future. It's the right decision and at last removes the threat of an enforced switchover from the radio landscape.”

To encourage commercial broadcasters to engage with DAB, the UK government will invest GB£21 million in a second national digital multiplex. Broadcasters using the existing commercial multiplex, owned by Arqiva, pay about GB£100,000 a month. There are local digital multiplexes and the BBC has their own. The BBC, invested in the original DAB patents, and the biggest commercial broadcasters Bauer Media and Global Radio support, with some qualification, a firm switch-over date. “We think it would be great if the BBC made Radio 1 or Radio 2 DAB only”, said Bauer Media CEO Paul Keenan at the Go Digital Conference.

The UK government conceded that the FM platform would remain available to local broadcasters after national channels are required to switch, which only raised concerns that FM would become something of a local radio ghetto. The Norwegian government, on setting a firm 2017 switch-over date for national channels, is allowing local stations to remain on FM, which, interestingly, has led newspaper publishers to buy local radio stations. Less populous countries with strong public broadcasters – Norway, Denmark and Switzerland, notably – have either set FM switch-off dates or no longer authorize new FM licenses.

“Through the end of 2019, FM will certainly be in operation,” said Swiss regulator Bakom radio director Nancy Wayland Bigler, quoted by Blick (December 2). Bakom isn’t renewing or awarding new FM licenses, though there have been exceptions for local commercial stations. The Swiss Federal Council is expected to set a firm switch-over date in 2017. Commercial broadcasters are of two minds on platform, though one mind on paying for two at once. Radio Energy (Zürich) is “planning an exit” from FM in 2019, said general manager Dani Büchi to persoenlich.com (December 1). The same week Radio 1 (Zürich) owner Roger Schawinski said he’d be withdrawing the station from the DAB+ multiplex.

In larger countries with richer commercial broadcasters the FM platform continues to reign supreme. Big French and German radio broadcasters have been very protective of their analogue franchises, effectively preventing more nimble digital operators from getting much of a toe-hold. It’s true; the future for radio broadcasting is digital. How and when it arrives is up to the listeners.

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