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Source: The Indianapolis StarDec.mini storage 20--If radio on smartphones catches on big -- not a sure thing, by any means -- credit will go to one man in particular:Indianapolis radio executive Jeff Smulyan.The chairman of Emmis Communications has pushed the FM radio-on-smartphone idea untiringly these past six years, while spending millions of dollars on technology to make it listener-friendly."It became a passion," Smulyan said. "I became fascinated" with the idea of turning every smartphone into, essentially, a Walkman that pulls in FM signals. (Enabling AM signals is technologically touchier, though AM could be coming in due course.)America doesn't need more radios -- there are 800 million of them in this nation, five in every house -- but FM-enabled smartphones are seen in the radio industry as a kind of Holy Grail that will boost listeners and ad revenue and make radio, well, "cool again," as Smulyan puts it.The idea has its skeptics, even as the first major phone carrier, Sprint, has come on board this year and has begun selling FM-enabled phones that will be available for up to 30 million of its users over the next three years."We think it could be pretty spectacular," Smulyan said of the Sprint deal.A 40-year veteran of radio, Smulyan wasn't a believer in the radio-smartphone connection when he was tapped by his fellow broadcasters six years ago to lead the charge on FM-enabled smartphones."I didn't know what it was," he said, sitting in his office overlooking Monument Circle. Smulyan isn't a techie -- proving it during a recent interview by failing to get his desktop computer to play a jazzy video about FM-enabled smartphones. The application finally sprang to life, though he didn't seem to know why.What Smulyan has going for him is a strong belief in the rightness of the cause, and a certain stick-to-it-iveness, said Dennis Wharton, executive vice president of communications for the National Association of Broadcasters in Washington, D.C."He's a bulldog," Wharton said of Smulyan, who's testified on the issue before Congress and the Federal Communications Commission. "If not for Jeff's leadership, I'm not sure we would have gotten this far."Wharton said the industry has made "phenomenal progress" in its fight to get FM-enabled smartphones in the hands of Americans. Even so, the Sprint deal is just "the first step" in what needs to be a much bigger rollout, he said.The obstacle to the radio industry: other major wireless carriers.They've resisted Smulyan and the NAB's entreaties to switch on the FM receiver chip that's built into most smartphones by the manufacturer but is typically turned off by the carrier so it doesn't work when it gets into the hands of users.The reason: Carriers have a profit incentive to ring up billable minutes to their customers for every possible smartphone use, including radio. Essentially, the FM chip is competition because it provides a much cheaper way to listen to radio than tuning in over the Internet.Which is why Smulyan and the NAB hope that Sprint will sign up millions of its customers to be FM radio-listening fans, using their Sprint phones, of course."Consumer demand ... will make other carriers want to do this. They probably are not going to do much with us until we can prove the consumer actually wants us," said Paul Brenner, president of the Emmis subsidiary TagStation LLC. TagStation has developed a radio smartphone app for consumers and related software that it sells to radio stations.More so than his radio stations, TagStation is Smulyan's skin in the game. With funding help from the NAB Labs, Smulyan through Emmis has spent millions of dollars -- he won't divulge the amount -- to develop the NextRadio app and start up TagStation.With no competition now for either the app or TagStation, Smulyan and Emmis, which he controls, stand to reap big gains if radio-on-smartphones catches on.TagStation has 12 full-time employees, most based in Indianapolis, including a newly hired sales manager. It sells content that ties into the NextRadio app, which lets radio stations interact with listeners through promotions, couponing, and the ability to access information about songs or buy tickets to shows."If people like it, we think we've got a big winner. That could be a very, very nice business," said Smulyan, who wouldn't share any estimate of projected sales.By drawing in more listeners and letting them interact with their favorite stations, "We think it can change the game for this industry," he said儲存Brenner estimates TagStation could grow to 50 employees within a few years if radio-smartphone use expands. TagStation also is negotiating with automakers to build the NextRadio app into their dashboard designs, so that drivers can click on the app from steering wheel-mounted radio controls.San Diego media research consultant Mark Ramsey isn't so upbeat about Smulyan's campaign."I'm not a Debbie Downer on the notion. I wish him luck," Ramsey said of Smulyan. But Ramsey said he doubts enough consumers want or need an FM radio feature on their smartphones.NextRadio has a long way to go to catch up to the millions of users of Internet-based radio programs such as Pandora and iHeartRadio, which can stream selected radio stations and music on mobile phones, he said."It's fine to say, 'Let's soup up capabilities of FM on a mobile device.' But at the end of the day everything that matters is Internet-based."Moreover, said Ramsey, "What problem are we solving (putting FM radio on smartphones)? That's my argument. People don't use this as a decider when shopping for phones."Smulyan seems surprised anyone wouldn't see the benefits of getting radio reception on smartphones, which drains the devices' batteries far slower than streaming, even as it saves the user on cell phone minutes. Having a radio on your smartphone also helps in times of major disasters when phone systems are knocked out, he said.Smulyan doesn't view streaming as a solution for radio, either because of its cost. For instance, Emmis' popular Los Angeles hip-hop station, Power 106, sends out its radio signal from an old-fashioned radio tower at the cost of $39,500 a year, Smulyan said. To stream the content over the Internet would cost $1 million."I think it matters," Smulyan said of the push to put FM radio on smartphones. "It can save consumers billions of dollars in phone fees. We're free and we're ubiquitous and now we're cool."NAB's Wharton said it won't be clear for several more years whether the push to put radio on smartphones will succeed.The radio industry is still trying to recover lost ad revenues from the recession of 2007-09. Revenues fell from a peak of $20 billion to $14 billion during the recession and have since rebounded to around $17 billion, he said.If the radio-on-smartphone gambit works, Wharton said of Smulyan, "this is his legacy to the broadcasting industry."And if it doesn't work? It will amount to an "elegant" experiment, Ramsey said, one that consumers chose not to embrace.Call Star reporter Jeff Swiatek at (317) 444-6483. Follow him on Twitter: @JeffSwiatek.FM radio on smartphonesHow it works:A $1.50 chip in most smartphones, once switched on by the carrier, turns the phone into an FM receiver, like the once-popular Walkman. Only certain Sprint smartphone models are now FM-enabled. Other companies don't offer the FM radio option.A free phone app, called NextRadio, allows phone users to interact with a growing number of more than 5,500 FM radio stations in the country. The app can give information about the music, the artist or the station's disc jockey, let listeners rate or share music, and offer promotions and even sell tickets to shows.Enhanced radio broadcasting through the app is a service that must be purchased by the radio station. An Emmis Communications subsidiary, TagStation, sells a cloud-based data service that supplements the radio broadcast with visual content and enhances over-the-air promos through the NextRadio app.FM radio on smartphonesHow it works:A $1.50 chip in most smartphones, once switched on by the carrier, turns the phone into an FM receiver, like the once-popular Walkman. Only certain Sprint smartphone models are now FM-enabled. Other companies don't offer the FM radio option.A free phone app, called NextRadio, allows phone users to interact with a growing number of more than 5,500 FM radio stations in the country. The app can give information about the music, the artist or the station's disc jockey, let listeners rate or share music, and offer promotions and even sell tickets to shows.Enhanced radio broadcasting through the app is a service that must be purchased by the radio station. An Emmis Communications subsidiary, TagStation, sells a cloud-based data service that supplements the radio broadcast with visual content and enhances over-the-air promos through the NextRadio app.Copyright: ___ (c)2013 The Indianapolis Star Visit The Indianapolis Star at .IndyStar.com Distributed by MCT Information Services迷你倉