Company Expects Increase in Radio-Enabled Smartphones

Parent Emmis Communications and its CEO Jeff Smulyan have pushed hard to have radio chips included in smartphones.

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NextRadio LLC says there will be a large increase this year in the number of FM chip-enabled smartphones hitting the market. The company is a subsidiary of Indianapolis-based Emmis Communications Inc. (Nasdaq: EMMS) and will have its NextRadio app on the new editions of Samsung Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge devices.

Additionally, the company says the app will be preloaded on its phones and will soon be available to download on T-Mobile phones. It says up to 15 million additional customers will have access to the technology as a result of the new releases.

NextRadio President Paul Brenner says "we are excited that the number of Android phones with FM radio continues to accelerate. The launch of the new Galaxy phones is a perfect start to 2016, since these phones are getting rave reviews and will be a top seller to millions of users who can now listen to free radio on their phone."

The technology allows users to listen, view and interact with local over-the-air radio stations in real-time on their smartphones.