The DRM Consortium General Assembly 2026, a comprehensive two-day event, concluded in Jakarta, Indonesia, on 6 May. This was the first time that the DRM Consortium partnered with an important broadcaster and DRM member, Radio Republik Indonesia, RRI, to hold its annual meeting in a country of the Asia-Pacific region where DRM is currently the prevalent digital broadcasting standard.
As this was a biennial election year for DRM, the full DRM members confirmed the election of the main body of the Consortium, the Steering Board, with unchanged composition from the last 2-year term.
Ms Ruxandra Obreja was re-elected as DRM Chair, and will serve alongside DRM Vice Chairs Mr Alexander Zink (Fraunhofer IIS) and Mr Matthew Phillips (CML Micro – newly appointed). The DRM members confirmed Mr Johannes von Weyssenhoff as DRM Technical Committee Chair.
Indonesia at the Centre of DRM Progress
Indonesia, a country of 280 million people and 17 500 islands, was chosen for the General Assembly as it leads the digital broadcasting way in the region after its historic decision to adopt the DRM standard to digitise radio services in the country in the AM and FM bands (VHF band-II) as well as VHF band III (174-202 MHz), accompanied by DAB+ (VHF band III only, 202-230 MHz) in 2023, and its regulation on transmitter services in 2024. RRI’s DRM services in the FM band are already on-air today from 9 sites throughout the country. The regulation on receivers is being worked on by the responsible Ministry (Komdigi).
International Participation and Key Announcements
The first, open session day of the General Assembly was attended by key representatives of the public broadcaster RRI in Jakarta and regional centres, private broadcasters, the Ministry and Regulator (Komdigi), the manufacturing industries (companies like Panasonic, Akari and Polytron), and the automotive industry (such as Toyota and Suzuki).
DRM members from countries including China, India, Germany, South Korea, US, UK, Switzerland, etc. joined the event live in Jakarta, while attendees from all continents had the opportunity to participate remotely.
On the first open session day of the DRM General Assembly the over 100 in-person and online participants showed great interest in the Indonesian developments, the Indian current DRM status, and the great progress made in China: DRM was adopted as a national Chinese Standard for the MF and HF bands in July 2025 and developments are accelerating. The importance of DRM’s Emergency Warning Functionality (EWF) is paramount, not only in Indonesia, but also in China where the standardisation of the in-vehicle emergency broadcasting reception is being worked on.
Strong Focus on DRM, Multi Standard and Car Receivers
The updates given to the General Assembly by DRM members, the Indonesian high officials and international experts were completed with numerous and innovative demonstrations of new DRM solutions, chipsets, modules and receivers.
The improved, energy-efficient and versatile chipset module from companies such as CML Micro (UK) and the result of its collaboration with Solar Grove and Alongside Tech (USA) immediately caught the attention of the participants.
On 5 May CML Micro, Glovane (South Korea) and NewGlee (China) launched a dual DRM-DAB+ receiver. RF2Digital of South Korea announced that with analogue, DRM and DAB+ receiver developments it has a fitting solution for Indonesia. Its Milan module is aimed at the automotive industry.
Fraunhofer IIS (Germany) announced that the Digital Radio Receiver Framework is ready for Multi-Standard Digital Radio, supporting the full DRM and DAB+ feature sets. There is now a prototype demonstration on Android Auto including Journaline TTS access. Starwaves of Switzerland, in cooperation with Fraunhofer IIS, launched a full-featured Dual-Standard Android SoftRadio App for DRM and DAB+, available in the Google Play Store. In addition, Fraunhofer IIS introduced its updated DRM ContentServer R8 head-end technology, available to broadcasters and for receiver testing and development through OEM partners.
This underlined one of the noteworthy features of the DRM General Assembly presentations and demonstrations: the fast development of dual-standard receiver solutions, stimulated recently by the adoption of DRM in Indonesia, South Africa and China.
A second feature of the open day General Assembly was the emphasis on digital radio in car dashboards and on the innovation and application of software for it. Inntot of India is already supplying software-based receivers for 2.2 million of the over 13 million cars with DRM reception on Indian roads. OptM, a company based in Bengaluru, India, is also involved in supplying locally developed solutions.
Dual-standard receiver solutions were a feature of the event. Several DRM members introduced, alongside DRM-DAB+ solutions, DRM-CDR modules and receivers aimed primarily at the Chinese market.
Dual-standard chipsets, tuners and digital radio coprocessors like those offered by Skyworks of USA and NXP for DRM in AM and FM bands and all recommended broadcast standards, are now available for the car industry and receiver manufacturing in general.
In fact, any part of the transmission chain from transmitters, even for dual standards, band II and band III, to receivers and mobile phone solutions and monitoring equipment, like the one shown for the first time by Redwood, a new DRM member from South Korea, and RFmondial are ready to use.
The authorities, governments, and regulators must decide the digitisation path and timeframe for their country. DRM alone or together with other open digital radio standards is ready, was the conclusion of the presentations and demonstrations.
The members present in the meeting hall of the RRI headquarters in Jakarta and elsewhere conveyed the message, that DRM dual-standard equipment can deliver complete country coverage, in excellent audio accompanied by multimedia services on all terrestrial broadcast bands.
EWF and Education Remain Key Priorities
During the General Assembly attendees showed great interest for some DRM special benefits like the Emergency Warning Functionality (EWF) and Distance Learning. Companies including CML, Fraunhofer IIS, Starwaves have shown how DRM solutions can deliver these benefits.
DRM Members Set Direction for the Future
During the members-only session on day 2, the DRM members reviewed the intense activities of the last year. The DRM Chair presented the strategy for the next two years with an emphasis on geographic consolidation and receiver roll-out.
The next targets are ambitious. DRM is prepared and in step with the current realities. One proof was the very launch of the updated DRM Handbook (version 6), now available as a free PDF download under handbook.drm.org.
The excellently organised event enabled by the essential support of RRI Indonesia showed the power of cooperation, the resilience of radio, the great position of DRM globally, especially in the Asia-Pacific region and its excellent prospects globally.
For Ruxandra Obreja, the DRM Consortium Chair,
“this General Assembly was one of the best organised, friendliest, most serious and richest in content and announcements we have held so far. DRM has steadily progressed but now it is on the cusp of getting quicker into even more cars, homes and classrooms than ever before. The DRM General Assembly was a moment to reflect and to decide how we go ahead. This unique event has been made possible with the support of our RRI colleagues and, especially of the President Director RRI, Dr D. Hendrasmo, the Technical Director M. Sujay, all the excellent and professional RRI staff. Being hosted by a broadcaster underlined that DRM technology has purpose and can deliver to listeners, as the modern digital radio standard and analogue AM/FM successor designed by the broadcast industry for the broadcast industry. With the right regulations and framework, DRM-only or dual-standard receivers are ready to be delivered in volume to help inform, educate, entertain listeners, even save their lives. This ground-breaking DRM General Assembly has been a unique event for whose success we are grateful to all our worldwide members and supporters and to RRI.”
