NAB's technology advocacy program, NAB FASTROAD, displayed a prototype Electronic Program Guide (EPG) system for HD radio at the BIAfn Financial Network booth during The NAB Radio Show in Austin. The system, an interactive on-screen guide that displays scheduled broadcast programming, is suited to serve the needs of local HD radio stations.

The EPG system, developed for the NAB FASTROAD technology advocacy program, was featured in conjunction with the release of a FASTROAD-commissioned report that describes the key business requirements and consumer-use scenarios for various HD radio-based EPG system designs.

The overall goals of this NAB FASTROAD project are to develop the business requirements, system architecture and specifications for an HD radio-based EPG. The project team – BIAfn, Broadcast Signal Lab (BSL) and Unique Interactive, which has developed similar EPG services for the digital audio broadcast market in Europe – has worked in close cooperation with iBiquity Digital Corporation, developers of HD radio technology, in coordinating the demo and report being released today.

Implementing an EPG for radio is inherently more difficult than for TV due to a variety of factors, including the mobile nature of radio listening and the wide variation in receiver displays, the report reveals. Taking these challenges into account, this report presents what the authors believe to be a workable design for a U.S. radio EPG system utilizing HD radio technology. Four possible delivery architectures are presented in the report, accommodating a range of station needs, from each station carrying its own EPG data, to various methods of cross-carriage via cooperation among station groups, or even an entire radio market.

The full text of the report and information on the NAB FASTROAD technology advocacy program are available at www.NABFASTROAD.org.