DAB Digital Radio in the UK, Italy, and Denmark
Posted on Thursday, June 4th, 2009 at 12:23pm. #
I’m at the EBU’s Digital Radio Conference, understanding more about how digital radio is being taken up across the European and Arabic States.
One of the most useful reasons to come to these conferences is to understand what is going on outside the UK. And, naturally, the rest of the world is keen to understand what’s happening within the UK. So, naturally, I got to hear from Grant Goddard (with a bit of a challenging presentation), then Denmark Radio, and finally RAI from Italy. So, here are my notes:
Grant Goddard – challenges in the UK
He quickly rushed through some positive things about DAB Digital Radio. Then pointed out that Ofcom’s forecasts in 2006 for digital listening said that we’d be at 35% by now; we’re actually at 20%. Similarly, RadioCentre’s forecasts have been out of kilter with where we actually are. And then goes through a lot of other forecasts which have all gone a bit wrong. Erk. What’s very clear is that forecasts are very rarely right. (Curiously, he doesn’t badmouth any Enders Analysis research, where he used to work. Nothing to do with their forecasts being even more wrong; predicting in some iPhone research that nobody would buy the iPod Touch, and significantly underestimating the takeup of the iPhone too, but anyway).
Then he goes through a few challenges to DAB in the UK. I’m expecting about four or five. Let’s see how many we get:
First challenge is the lack of consumer awareness of “digital radio” – at least, what the term actually means. 90% of the population have access to it, yet a much smaller amount actually thinks they have access to it.
Second challenge is RAJAR – which is limited to traditional, linear, radio. No listen-again; no last.fm or Spotify; nothing. Compares a different RAJAR survey (PALVIS?), and says that internet radio, in total, is probably similar in terms of reach to DAB Digital Radio. (I probably don’t disagree – reach is very different to hours).
Third challenge, he says, is the volume of legacy analogue radios in the marketplace currently. And points out that only 22% of new radios sold in the UK are DAB – the rest are analogue. And he points out that total radio sales is on a downward slope.
Fourth challenge, therefore, he says is a declining radio receiver market. People are buying less radios.
Fifth challenge, he says, is that DAB purchasing growth has moved into negative territory – i.e. less people bought a DAB radio receiver this year than last year). (It’s a recession, Grant. That’s kind of what happens in recessions. And DAB has held its head up high in comparison to other consumer electronics.)
Sixth challenge is mobile: he points that 34 million handsets were sold in the UK last year; only 2 million DAB radios. And he says that only 9% of people bother to use the FM radio in their phones. 45% of mobile phones will have FM radio by 2011 – but there aren’t any mobiles with DAB Digital Radio in them yet.
Seventh challenge: DAB coverage isn’t as good as FM
Eighth challenge: there’s not much incentive for FM switch-off. 88% of consumers are satisfied with their existing choice of stations, he says, so people don’t need more choice. There’s no real reuse idea for FM yet.
Ninth challenge: that the DAB rollout in the UK has gone a little slower recently – lots of new multiplexes simply haven’t launched.
Tenth challenge: that coverage is fairly uneven, because of different multiplexes covering different areas.
Eleventh challenge: that DAB reception isn’t very good. (Um, that’s probably the same as the seventh challenge.)
Twelfth challenge: the content on digital radio isn’t very good. He points out that only 5% of commercial radio listening is to exlusively digital content. And only 3% of BBC radio listening is to exclusively digital content, he says. He says that this isn’t growing.
Thirteenth challenge: DAB doesn’t really give you much extra choice – mostly they’re simulcast services.
Fourteenth challenge: quite a few digital-only services have been switched off. Might be related to 12th.
Fifteenth challenge: carriage costs are really high
Sixteenth challenge: DAB digital radios in the main aren’t “mobile”. Most of the listening is in the home. So that’s bad too.
Seventeenth challenge: DAB+ won’t come to the UK because there are so many receivers out there with MP2.
Eighteenth challenge: other platforms – internet, television – are doing well. The average DAB owner is 46 years old. And only 17% of those are aged under 35. So he says DAB isn’t really very interesting to young people.
Nineteenth challenge: DAB/FM combo receivers are the norm. This is apparently a bad thing, though I don’t quite see why.
Twentieth challenge: it’s cost £500m to roll out DAB. And he says that DAB investment is proving too costly.
And finally (!) the twenty-first challenge is that apparently digital switchover is unlikely to happen. Not quite sure why: the reasons whisked off the screen pretty quickly. And apparently he said that 50% of radio listening will be digital by 2019.
Well, with that positive writeup, I’m chirpy and chipper about the future of my industry. I wonder what he’d say about FM!
Erik Heinz Kjeldsen from DR – digital radio in Denmark
He hopes that his presentation will be a bit more optimistic than the story from the UK. Me too!
So, in Denmark…
DAB receiver penetration is about 30% of population. Fairly evenly distributed with age, men/women, geographical. And 25% of people who don’t have them expect to buy them in the next 12 months. Monthly reach for DAB listening is 40%; but market share is about 10%. (Similar to the UK, he points out).
He points out that the Danish radio market is interesting. Public service has a 75% share. There are two national commercial stations – one with 80% coverage, one with just 40%. So, the remaining 25% is divided between these national stations, and regional stations, and local stations – and unfortunately, there was a bidding war for the licences, which means that it’s difficult to make these a profitable concern. Radio’s only got a few % share of the total advertising market, and it’s a falling share – they’ve not really done very well dealing with the media agencies. So, he says that it’s a hard marketplace.
Choice is driving DAB in Denmark: but in Denmark, it’s a different deal from the UK – because listeners move from very little choice on analogue to quite a lot more. Get a DAB receiver and you get 14 DR public service channels (10 new stations), and 3 commercial radio stations.
He reckons that DAB has the capability to restart the radio market in Denmark. 3 of the top 5 DAB offerings are DAB only channels – each bigger than known brands from FM. And commercial radio’s coverage is strengthened markedly. I asked what those top 3 stations are for your benefit, dear reader – one is a young-female soft-CHR (I’m guessing a slightly younger Magic/Heart). Another is a localised older audience service (kind of BBC local radio). And finally, the third is a popular folk music channel (and heaven knows what the equivalent of that is in the UK!).
He reckons Denmark will be first to switch off FM, and says they urgently need a date. He reckons 50% is unrealistic. But he wants to work together with the rest of the EU, to get radio receivers in the car, and pan-European commitment to DAB. And “We need each other”. We do indeed. A good fact-filled presentation.
Guiseppe Baccini, from Rai Way – DAB in Italy
Rai Way is 100% owned by RAI, the first Italian TV broadcasting company. Rai Way is kind of the equivalent of BBC Transmission, from what I kind of understand, except it still exists, obviously. Rai Way also does the broadcasting for commercial broadcasters on DAB in Italy – and also many other countries, including Tunisia.
In Italy, about 60% of the population is covered by DAB for RAI.
He says that “they need receivers”. They’re looking for the EBU Profile 2 receiver for Italy, to do enriched audio with slideshow and BIFS. But then he talks about the French approach, using DMB-A, as not an optimal solution.
He shows some of the work they’re doing with slideshow (which he’s calling SLS). He’s also running something called IsoRadio, which is a slideshow and DLS-text channel giving you travel information, alongside a radio station that gives you traffic and weather. He’s also running TPEG trials – he’s implemented RTM, NWS and WEA are coming soon, and TEJ, HEI and KPW are planned. (I’ve made those last three up – I’ve no idea what they were).
Interestingly, they’re also planning to use DMB to broadcast Parliament, using BIFS to enable you to get the text of the speeches as well as live video. (A clever idea, this – it panders to the egos of Parliament, but also gets quite a good amount of content to really give this a good test.)
In Tunisia, they’re working on DVB-T, DAB and DRM. For DAB, they’re running a pilot project. They’ve planned lots, but they need to get approval from someone in Italy to continue.
He reckons that a switchover from FM radio to internet radio simply isn’t possible, and he reckons, therefore, that digital radio is important.
More from this conference later.
Photo: Amy Keus. Used under licence – thanks!
Bev MARKS
Per G
Roger Durrant
Michael Lloyd
Yes 9=11 and true: DAB coverage, thus reception is no where near as good as FM, so what hope is the question I have posed several times before in various forums? Ofcom and BBC et al have to sort out before any hope of wow factor reception in portable radios. In the meantime new DAB Tx sites all over the place does not help the fundamental need for working out power levels needed to deliver satisfactory signal strength at 1 metre above ground level where radio is best as a mobile medium for “walk-radios”/phones with DAB receivers.