13 Feb DRM: The Future of Indian Radio – Business Opportunities for Stakeholders, a National Seminar on February 28th, New Delhi
The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), in cooperation with the DRM Consortium and partners, is organizing a one day National Seminar on: “DRM: The Future of Indian Radio – Business Opportunities for Stakeholders” on the 28 February 2014 at Hotel Le Meridien, Sovereign I, New Delhi.
The adoption of digital technology in broadcasting provides the listener with enhanced audio quality, service reliability and many additional features. In India following the Government decision to adopt the digital mode of transmission, All India Radio (AIR) has begun a phased programme to switch from analogue to digital broadcasting with the target for complete digitization by 2017. The digital technology adopted is Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM) – an open, all-band, global standard with a number of operating modes designed for both AM and VHF broadcast bands.
The DRM system offers many benefits to the listeners, manufacturers, broadcasters and regulators including improved audio quality, added data services, emergency warning alerts, targeted advertising and a more efficient transmission system that lowers power costs.
The seminar featuring these DRM benefits has a number of objectives: to create visibility of the DRM standard amongst the stakeholders; to hear from key members of DRM Consortium and learn more about the features and benefits offered by the DRM standard for transmitters and receiver manufacturers; to share the AIR plans for their digitization of radio broadcasting; to flag the opportunities available to Indian industry in designing, developing and manufacturing cost effective DRM receivers for the domestic and exports markets; to understand the potential of the ‘value-added’ services that can be made available on DRM receivers and facilitate further interaction/business meetings between the developers/ manufacturers and technology providers.
The seminar is supported by BECIL and key members of the DRM Consortium. They will be all present in Delhi at this ground-breaking event which is the first of its kind, for DRM in India, involving technology specialists and Indian industry representatives.
According to Dr. R C Chopra, Senior Adviser, Confederation of Indian Industry: “the DRM services will not only add a new dimension to radio listening experience through its high audio quality and rich media features but also open up new sources of revenue for the broadcasters.”
Ruxandra Obreja, DRM Consortium Chairman, believes this will mark a new phase in the process of getting DRM into India: “While the DRM infrastructure is being rolled out in the country, getting closer to the Indian broadcast manufacturing industries is now critical. And the support we are receiving from the Confederation of Indian Industry is crucial in this respect. The pressure to get receivers in the hands of Indian listeners is of paramount importance.”
About DRM
Digital Radio Mondiale™ (DRM) is the universal, openly standardised digital broadcasting system for all broadcasting frequencies.
The DRM standard comprises of two major configurations: ‘DRM30’ intended for broadcasts on short, medium and long wave up to 30 MHz and providing large coverage areas and low power consumption. The configuration for the VHF bands above 30 MHz is called ‘DRM+’, tailored for local and regional coverage with broadcaster-controlled transmissions.
All DRM configurations share the same audio coding, data and multimedia services, service linking, multiplexing and signalling schemes. DRM provides high quality sound combined with a wealth of enhanced features: Surround Sound, Journaline text information, Slideshow, EPG, and data services.
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