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Six Additional Radio Stations Join Arbitron Portable People Meter Trial
Nearly 1,200 Consumers Already Recruited To Carry New Audience
Measurement Device. 03.07.02
NEW YORK, March 7, 2002 - Arbitron Inc. (NYSE: ARB) announced today that six additional radio stations serving the Philadelphia DMA® have begun encoding their audio signal for the U.S. market trial of the revolutionary new radio, television and cable TV audience measurement device - the Portable People Meter (PPM).
Since the second phase of the U.S. market trial began on January 7, 2002, WAEB-FM, WCTO-FM, WKXW-FM, WLEV-FM, WRFY-FM and WZZO-FM have joined the 38 Philadelphia area radio stations that have already been participating in the PPM trial during 2001.
As Arbitron progresses into the second and final phase of the PPM trial, 44 radio stations, eight TV stations, and 22 cable networks in the Philadelphia market are now participating by encoding their signals using the latest generation of Arbitron encoders. Many of these outlets have been using Arbitron PPM encoders since August 2000.
Since January 7, Arbitron has also recruited more than 1,150 consumers out of a planned total of 1,500 consumers who will be outfitted with the new passive audience measurement device. The Portable People Meter automatically reports their exposure to the 74 radio stations, television stations and cable networks that are currently encoding their audio signals for the U.S. market trial.
The company intends to recruit the entire planned panel of 1,500 consumers, age six and older, by the end of March 2002. In the second and final phase of the U.S. market trial, Arbitron plans to give the industry its first direct look at individual station ratings for radio stations, television stations and cable networks generated by the Portable People Meter in the Philadelphia market. These estimates will be compared with individual station and cable network ratings delivered by current audience measurement systems.
Nielsen Media Research is providing financial support as well as its television survey research expertise in this trial of the Portable People Meter. Nielsen also has an option to join Arbitron in the commercial deployment of the Arbitron Portable People Meter in the United States.
The PPM is a pager-sized device that is carried by consumers. It automatically detects inaudible codes that TV and radio broadcasters as well as cable networks embed in the audio portion of their programming using encoders provided by Arbitron. At the end of each day, the survey participants place the meters into base stations that recharge the devices and send the collected codes to Arbitron for tabulation. The meters are equipped with a motion sensor that allows Arbitron to monitor the compliance of the PPM survey participants every day - a quality control feature unique to the Arbitron Portable People Meter in the realm of media research.
About Arbitron
Arbitron Inc. (NYSE: ARB) is an international media and marketing research firm serving radio broadcasters, cable companies, advertisers, advertising agencies and outdoor advertising companies in the United States, Mexico and Europe. Arbitron's core businesses are measuring network and local market radio audiences across the United States; surveying the retail, media and product patterns of local market consumers; and providing application software used for analyzing media audience and marketing information data.
Arbitron Webcast Services measures the audiences of audio and video content on the Internet, commonly known as webcasts. The Company is developing the Portable People Meter, a new technology for radio, TV and cable ratings.
Arbitron's marketing and business units are supported by a world-renowned research and technology organization located in Columbia, Maryland. Arbitron has approximately 800 full-time employees; its executive offices are located in New York City.
Through its Scarborough Research joint venture with VNU Media Measurement & Information, Arbitron also provides media and marketing research services to the broadcast television, magazine, newspaper and online industries.
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DMA
is a registered trademark of Nielsen Media Research.
This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning
of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The statements regarding
Arbitron in this release that are not historical in nature, particularly those
that utilize terminology such as "may," "will," "should,"
"likely," "expects," "anticipates," "estimates,"
"believes" or "plans," or comparable terminology, are forward-looking
statements based on current expectations about future events, which Arbitron
has derived from the information currently available to it. These forward-looking
statements involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause
our results to be materially different from results implied in such forward-looking
statements. These risks and uncertainties include whether we will be able to:
-realize the benefits we expect to achieve from our spin-off from Ceridian Corporation;
- renew contracts with large customers as they expire;
- successfully execute our business strategies, including timely implementation
of our Portable People Meter and our Webcast Ratings services, as well as expansion
of international operations;
-effectively manage the impact of further consolidation in the radio industry;
and
- keep up with rapidly changing technological needs of our customer base, including
creating new products and services that meet these needs.
Additional important factors known to Arbitron that could cause forward-looking
statements to turn out to be incorrect are identified and discussed from time
to time in Arbitron's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including
in particular the risk factors discussed under the caption "ITEM 1. BUSINESS
- Business Risks" in our Annual Report on Form 10-K, which discussion is
incorporated herein by reference.
The forward-looking statements contained in this release speak only as of the
date hereof, and Arbitron undertakes no obligation to correct or update any
forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events
or otherwise.
