Battle on as the wireless goes digital

By Graeme Philipson
September 6, 2005
AsiaSpace chairman Dick Butler is lobbying for a satellite-based
digital radio system.

AsiaSpace chairman Dick Butler is lobbying for a satellite-based digital radio system.

We all know the world is going digital. TV is digital, music is digital, phones are digital. The move from analog waves to digital bits and bytes is revolutionising the communications and entertainment industries, as media move to the one underlying technology.

This means increased convergence, and the eventual so-called next-generation network where the internet, telephone and TV networks merge into one. It is not far off and it will change the world.

But what about radio?

Just as other media can be digitised, so can radio. There is an enormous amount of work going on worldwide in the development and deployment of digital radio. But there are competing standards, technologies and business models.

While digital radio test transmissions have started from a number of Sydney radio stations, the Federal Government has not yet determined the technology or bandwidth that will be used. The radio industry is lobbying hard for the Government to legislate for a system similar to that used to introduce pay TV, where existing players are protected from competition for a certain time (the industry is lobbying for 10 years) to compensate for the cost of introducing digital technology, estimated at $400 million.

That is just the cost of infrastructure. To listen to digital radio, we will all need to buy digital radio sets - existing radios will not work. So the move to digital radio will be slow. Sound quality and reception will be much better and digital radio will enable add-on services such as data transmission. 2GB in Sydney is trialling a service that transmits sports scores, so that the score of the game you are listening to is constantly displayed on the radio's LCD screen.

The Government is considering submissions from interested parties before deciding which technology to use. The radio industry lobby is pushing for a technology known as Eureka 147 but other technologies are being considered.

AsiaSpace, a company promoting the use of digital satellite broadcasting, describes Eureka 147 as "very old terrestrial-only technology that has not been particularly successful in any market". AsiaSpace is a subsidiary of WorldSpace, a US-based company that is launching satellites to provide digital radio to populated areas around the globe.

AsiaSpace has invested millions of dollars in a high-tech satellite station perched above a building in Melbourne's Southbank, from where the company's Asian satellite is monitored and controlled. Its chairman, Dick Butler, is one of Australia's satellite pioneers and a former head of the International Telecommunications Union.

"By lobbying for the introduction of an old technology the radio industry is trying to raise the barriers to entry. We should be lowering them," Mr Butler says.

He makes the point that a terrestrial-only technology such as Eureka 147 is not suited to Australia's vast distances and that a satellite-based system, with terrestrial repeaters in populated areas, would have many more applications.

The battle for digital radio standards in Australia is under way in earnest. Will the Government, yet again, listen to its media mates and introduce another restrictive pay TV style regime? Or will it move ahead with innovative technology that will unlock the possibilities of the digital millennium?

There is a strong chance the vested interests will win again. Given this Government's record with issues such as datacasting it's hard to be optimistic.
