Toyota Wins The Month of March

4-2-15

We always like to keep you informed about how Radio's biggest ad category is doing and in March it was a mixed bag. Toyota lead the pak selling 226,000 vehicles for an increase of 4.5% over 2014. For the first quarter, Toyota sales are up 10.5%. Ford reported a 3.5% decline in March, GM checked in down 2.4%, Nissan slipped 2.7% and Honda declined 5.3%. Hyundai reported sales were up 12% over 2014, delivering 75,019 vehicles. Analysts believe the industry will sell nearly 17 million vehicles which translates into another strong year for automakers.

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Slacker Expands To Toyota And Lexus

11-21-14

The new Slacker Radio app is available now to owners of select Lexus models and coming soon to select Toyotas from model years 2011 to 2015. Slacker will be added as part of an update for select Toyota Entune and Lexus Enform App Suites. The new app adds deeper functionality and access to the Slacker Radio service, giving Toyota and Lexus owners the ability to create uniquely personalized radio stations, and tune into hundreds of curated radio stations (including comedy and programming from ESPN and ABC News).

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Toyota Rolling Out HD

9-4-13

iBiquity announced today the 2014 Tundra, Corolla, Sequoia, 4Runner, and Tacoma are the first Toyota vehicles to launch integrated audio and real-time traffic and weather services using Clear Channel?s Total Traffic HD Network (TTN) and HD Radio Technology. The 2014 Toyota Corolla, Tundra, and Sequoia are now available with the 4Runner and Tacoma arriving in dealerships later this month.
Toyota has launched two new systems integrating HD Radio digital audio entertainment and TTN?s real-time traffic and weather information:
- For vehicles with navigation systems, Toyota will provide a digital audio and navigation system driven by the first of its kind hybrid technology capable of receiving digital traffic and weather information from both HD Radio stations and the cell phone network, using the driver?s smartphone connected with the Toyota Entune system.
- For vehicles without navigation, Toyota will offer a premium display audio system complete with free traffic maps and weather information, all delivered by HD Radio stations across the country.
Both systems will also offer the latest digital audio features including Artist Experience?, allowing listeners to view images such as album art on their radio screens as they enjoy their favorite HD Radio stations. 

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Toyota Picks Total Traffic For Dash Info

1-7-13

Clear Channel's Total Traffic Network and Toyota have announced a three-year agreement that will integrate real-time traffic and The Weather Channel information into the dashboards of select 2013 Toyota and Lexus models. The new Toyota models will feature the first consumer-facing real-time delivery of information and graphics inside a vehicle via an HD Radio signal.
Toyota VP Jon Bucci said, ?We are excited about this value-oriented solution for providing important services to our customers. The strengthening of our partnership with Clear Channel Media and Entertainment provides even more in-vehicle experiences by bringing real-time information to our customers.?

Featured In-Dash Services To Include:
- Doppler weather radar: Drivers will have instant access to The Weather Channel?s Doppler weather radar overlaid onto their existing in-dash navigation map.
- Current weather conditions and forecasts: Drivers will be able to easily access The Weather Channel?s local and national forecasts for over 120 cities with a touch of the console screen.
- Real-time traffic: These easy-to-understand maps and incident coverage reports are updated every two minutes and offer current conditions, as well as upcoming 15-, 30- and 45-minute predictive traffic information.

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Toyota Gives Love to Pandora

Pandora says Toyota will be offering an embedded version of Pandora on the 2012 Camry and 2012 Tacoma.  Both vehicles began to appear on dealer lots in September 2011. Pandora is available via the Toyota Entune system. With Entune, Pandora controls are made available via the radio dashboard, allowing drivers to easily select stations, thumb songs up and down, and skip songs using the vehicle's controls.

The key to connecting Pandora with Entune is the smartphone; Entune is currently compatible with Android, Blackberry and iPhone smartphones. The Camry is America's best-selling car(i) and the Tacoma is the best-selling compact pickup truck in the U.S.

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Toyota To Install HD With iTunes Tagging In 2012 Camry

Toyota says the new vehicle along with HD Radio Technology will make its debut at dealerships this fall. iBiquity President and CEO Robert Struble (pictured) says Toyota's announcement is very significant because, "It's one more very notable milestone in a long effort. There will be more to come." 19 automotive brands have announced that HD Radio Technology is or will be available as a factory installed feature including Audi, Bentley, BMW, Ford, Hyundai, Jaguar, Kia, Land Rover, Lexus, Lincoln, Mercedes-Benz, MINI USA, Rolls-Royce, Scion, Subaru, Tesla, Toyota, Volkswagen and Volvo. Camry has been the best selling vehicle in the US for several years now.

Struble says this success, and others with automakers, are multi-year efforts with a huge number of interactions, with folks inside and outside of iBiquity working with the automaker. "I and most other iBiquity execs have visited with Toyota multiple times over the years, in their facilities in Japan and here in the US. The primary customer responsibility falls on our Detroit-based OEM business development team, who did a great job here. Toyota was ultimately very impressed with the nationwide HD Radio station infrastructure the broadcast industry has built, with the rapid adoption by other automakers and with the value that HD Radio offered to their drivers, especially some of the new features like iTunes Tagging."   

Earlier this year, Toyota announced the adoption of HD Radio Technology starting in 2011.  Scion recently announced that they are making the technology a standard feature with their 2012 audio products. Struble says automakers are recognizing the huge value they have in that dashboard and HD Radio is certainly parto of what's being offered to the consumer. "The growth in factory installed HD Radio receivers in cars has been phenomenal. We will see another doubling of sales in 2011. This is critical to broadcasters because of the amount of listening that goes on in cars and the new competition radio is seeing in the digital dashboard. And we see that rapid growth continuing."

iTunes tagging is a safe way to save your favorite songs and when installed on an HD radio, as Struble points out, local stations get it on the action. "I like a song I am listening to on an HD Radio station. I press the radio touch screen where it says 'tag'. The info on that song is stored in the radio. If my iPod/iPhone is connected in the car, the tagged info is automatically transferred to that device, if not, it will be transferred the next time I connect it. And when I next sync that device on my computer to iTunes, I will find a folder in iTunes labeled 'tagged' that will have all the songs I tagged. I can preview and purchase them at that point. And if I do buy, the station that I was listening to when I tagged the song will get a finder's fee on the sale from Apple.
Pretty cool feature. Certainly better than fumbling for a pen and paper while driving if I want to remember a song."

Today, there are over 2,000 AM & FM stations broadcasting with HD Radio Technology with more than 1,300 additional digital only FM HD2/HD3/HD4 multicast channels sending new exciting programming.

To get in touch with Bob Struble go HERE
For more information on iBuiquity go HERE

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