Excerpt from press release on 1 December headlined: "DAB is here to stay! An
international response from WorldDAB to the recently published statement by
the Berlin and Brandenburg Media Authority (MABB)"

London, 1 December: The Media Authority of Berlin and Brandenburg is
becoming more and more isolated from the rest of Europe - and, indeed, the
world - in its support for other technologies at the expense of DAB digital
radio.

The authority, which regulates media in the region, recently called for DAB
Digital Audio Broadcasts to be scrapped in the Lander, saying the technology
is "outdated" and a new standard should be adopted for digital radio by
2007.

Elsewhere in Germany, DAB broadcasting enjoys the support of local
regulators and broadcasters. In this context, it might have been wiser for
MABB to address the real issues with DAB in Germany, which have nothing to
do with the technology itself.

The existing strong industry support must be corroborated by the
introduction of DAB promotion on the FM network, an increase in transmission
power to improve indoor reception and an increase in available spectrum in
Band III. These criteria will finally allow DAB to fully succeed in a
country that has heavily invested in a technology that is robust, reliable,
flexible, established and ridden with opportunities for future developments,
such as in the world of multimedia content delivery and telecommunications.

Prof Dr Wolf-Dieter Ring, president of BLM, the authority responsible for
commercial broadcasting in Bavaria, explains: "DAB is the ideal system for
the digitalization of radio and for the broadcast of data services. The
problem does not lie in the DAB standard, but rather in the lack of consumer
awareness and of effective marketing. BLM is fully committed to building
widespread DAB awareness amongst German consumers."

Along the same lines, Prof Siegle of IMDR, the Digital Radio Marketing
Initiative, says: "There is no better system than DAB to take radio digital.
The standard was adopted in Germany in 2000, and like all new technologies
we need to allow for a certain time-span before a full market is created.
DAB plays a crucial part in the world of digital technologies, and the whole
industry, in Germany and elsewhere, recognizes that."

(Much more on this story at http://medianetwork.blogspot.com/ )