2-10-14
Apple launched the free iTunes Radio service in Australia joining Spotify and Pandora who were already there. iTunes Radio is also expected to launch in New Zealand, Canada, and the UK in the coming months. The service first launched here in the United States back in September with Apple's iOS 7 mobile software.
10-8-13
Having agreements in place with Vivendi's Universal Music Group and other record companies could help iTunes Radio expand into more countries than Pandora and Spotify. Bloomberg reports Apple already has plans to launch in The U.K and Canada in early 2014 and Apple Senior V.P. in charge of iTunes Eddie Cue told the AP last week the plans are to expand into 100 countries. He did not give a time frame on that expansion. Apple launched iTunes Radio last month.
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9-4-13
As the September 19th launch of iTunes Radio approaches, Apple has gone on a hiring binge at iAd, its ad-supported streaming music service. According to AdAge iTunes Radio will broaden iAd's inventory from just mobile banners to audio and video ads as well. When iTunes Radio goes live, it will launch with a host of major advertisers, including McDonald's, Nissan, Pepsi and Procter & Gamble which paid about $10 million each to be exclusive iTunes Radio advertisers in their category. eMarketer says iAd's U.S. revenue will grow from $213 million this year to $376 million in 2014 and $623 million in 2015.
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7-3-13
TechCrunch reports that Spotify?s ?Discover? feature is now available on the iPhone. The news feed offers recommendations, songs and playlists based on current listening habits. The feature is powered by algorithms similar to Spotify?s radio for music discovery purposes, but it?s not limited to recommendations made solely based on your plays. Discover will also alert users to New Releases on Spotify, music that?s popular in their area or popular on Spotify more generally, music shared by artists and others you follow, and more. Read the full TechCrunch article HERE
6-13-13
CNET writer Paul Sloan wrote an excellent piece HERE about the Apple start-up iTunes Radio and the online champion Pandora. He points out that Pandora will remain number one for the foreseeable future, while Apple, most likely, has much bigger ambitions. Those ambitions include taking their product worldwide, something Pandora has been slow to pursue. And both have big plans to get into what radio has owned forever -- the automobile.
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6-11-13
Clear Channel Communications CEO Bob Pittman was quoted in the Wall Street Journal saying he doesn?t see Apple?s new product as a threat to terrestrial radio or iHeartRadio. He's said all along, especially when discussing Pandora that custom radio doesn?t appear to be a viable freestanding business."
Pittman told the Journal that, "while listeners tune in to FM radio to ?join the world,? they listen to custom radio services to have ?a very private experience,? and now that so many electronics makers and subscription streaming companies are offering personalized radio, it?s no longer the main event." Read the Journal story HERE
(6/11/2013 7:10:54 AM)
ITunes radio with SIRI functionality is part of a bigger push to penetrate autos and that is a threat to radio...
“What if you could get iOS on the screen that is built into your car,” Apple SVP Eddy Cue asked on-stage at WWDC. Turns out he wasn’t just being rhetorical — Apple has confirmed that it is working with a slew of car manufacturers to bring the iOS experience into cars (the initiative is called, unimaginatively enough, “iOS In The Car”)starting with in 2014.
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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