As we’ve covered in recent podcasts, all is not well with DAB in the UK – specifically with commercial radio stations on DAB.
The commercial national multiplex, owned by Digital One, is sounding decidely empty since the departure of the GCap stations, and with Channel 4’s decision not to launch the Channel 4 Radio stations… the multiplex is half-empty.
To help out the struggling multiplex, it looks like the BBC is considering lending a hand. The Beeb is considering shifting some of its digital channels to the commercial multiplex – this would allow space for more BBC channels, or to allow improvements to the quality of BBC stations, which are running on a low bitrate.
Good to see the BBC pushing on with DAB – just a shame that commercial radio can’t make a go of DAB