Kenwood Ships Multicast HD Radio

With growing interest in multicasting FM broadcasts, Kenwood USA Corp. is shipping the new KTC-HR100TR HD Radio tuner, which the company says is the first in the industry built from scratch to feature multicasting. It retails for $480. The new external HD Radio Tuner connects with most Kenwood in-dash receivers and is feature-compatible with the KTC-HR100MC.
The multicasting feature supports the simultaneous broadcast of three or more audio and text streams on one FM frequency and will indicate station name, artist and song title on the head unit display.
Mike Bergman, vice president of New Digital Technologies for Kenwood USA Corp., stated: “Multicasting is the future of the FM dial. The KTC-HR100TR is available in volume and shipping now to help enable this revolution in broadcasting.”
According to Ibiquity Digital, more than 500 stations are on the air with a digital signal. The company believes most terrestrial stations that convert will choose to multicast.
Kenwood was one of the original Tomorrow Radio partners, along with NPR and Harris, for the multicasting concept. Ibiquity also was a partner.
The KTC-HR100TR will display the NPR Multicast logo.
“The Kenwood product is the first HD Radio receiver to be granted NPR Multicast certification,” stated Mike Starling, NPR vice president for engineering and operations.
The KTC-HR100TR tuner can connect with 40 Kenwood mobile audio receivers, mobile video receivers, and controllers. Models supported go back to the 2003 model year and display the “HD Radio-Ready” logo. More than 1 million cars have Kenwood head units that will work with the KTC-HR100TR, the company says.