The DRM Digital Radio standard took centre stage at the China Content Broadcasting Network (CCBN) exhibition, an annual event held at the China National Convention Centre in Beijing. Across forums, technical sessions and exhibition stands, the message was consistent: China’s DRM ecosystem has moved beyond the standards stage and is now advancing on multiple fronts – field testing, deployment, and domestic industrialisation.
CCBN is a premier event organised by the Academy of Broadcasting Science (ABS), National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA). It covers a wide range of fields, including broadcasting and television, technological integration, information-based audiovisual, consumer electronics, telecommunications, IT and more.
Professional audiences included broadcasting companies from across China, government representatives and leaders involved in digital broadcasting, universities, research institutes, industry associations, as well as sectors such as education, media, telecommunications, IT and consumer electronics.
DRM in China: National Rollout and Key Applications
As China is working towards the national mandate and rollout of the DRM and CDR digital radio standards for domestic coverage, the extra benefits of DRM – such as the Emergency Warning Functionality (EWF) – the new modules and receiver solutions recently unveiled and the performance of DRM in cars were also part of the DRM Consortium members’ contribution to CCBN 2026.
The DRM Consortium members CML Micro, Fraunhofer IIS, Nautel, RFmondial, RF2Digital, Elements Innovation, NewGlee and Starwaves presented innovative DRM solutions covering the full chain from transmission to monitoring and reception.
Trusted Broadcast Technologies and Innovative Use Cases in China
A consortium of domestic and international industry leaders – including Beijing BBEF Science & Technology, Fraunhofer IIS, RFmondial and SimReal Technology – presented a comprehensive set of professional DRM solutions encompassing the entire broadcast chain for the DRM standard and China’s GY/T 423-2025 specification. These solutions ranged from professional DRM ContentServer head-end systems and multichannel DRM modulators to monitoring and measurement receivers, as well as consumer-, mobile phone-, and automotive-ready SDR-based radio implementations.
The Emergency Warning Functionality (EWF), a core part of the DRM standard, is a key factor in the digitisation of the Chinese broadcasting market and a major driver in the sustained modernisation of the country’s radio infrastructure. DRM’s EWF combines alarm announcements with audio and Journaline text information, enabling efficient and reliable public alerts.
A critical application of EWF is in the automotive sector. Fraunhofer IIS, in collaboration with its local partner SimReal Technology, introduced a geofencing-guided system designed to enhance road safety. By leveraging geofencing technology, the system can “wake up” the radios in vehicles within specific geographic boundaries with pinpoint accuracy, ensuring that emergency alerts are delivered only to relevant drivers. This reduces information overload while maximising the speed and efficiency of disaster response on the road.
DRM shortwave also showcased its versatile data-carrying capacity. ABRS demonstrated a high-precision positioning system that uses shortwave frequencies to carry BeiDou satellite data (DGNSS). ABRS presented both a standard-compliant DRM data service and a proprietary lab demo, proving how shortwave can serve as a reliable backup or primary link for positioning data.
Beyond positioning, the initiative is pushing for “Shortwave + Industry-Specific IoT.” By targeting “blackout zones”, ABRS is calling for pilot projects in specialised industries, including oceanic fisheries, geohazard monitoring and remote resource exploration, positioning DRM as a critical backbone for low-bandwidth, long-distance IoT.
Shortwave Innovation Initiative and Growing Product Portfolios
The opening of the Multi-Channel Network Collaborative Development Forum on 24 April saw the launch of the Shortwave Broadcasting Innovation Initiative, led by the Radio Station Administration Bureau of China’s National Radio and Television Administration (NRTA), together with Communication University of China and other industry partners.
The initiative names DRM digital shortwave as a central technology pillar and frames its work along four lines: technology innovation, content innovation, service-model innovation and industry collaboration. Concretely, it sets out to coordinate the digital upgrade of China’s medium- and shortwave transmitter network – more than 600 stations – and to support the rollout of national industry standard GY/T 423-2025, Technical Specification for Medium- and Shortwave Digital Sound Broadcasting. Public-service applications in education, culture and emergency information are flagged as priority content categories.
The launch is significant because it brings the regulator, the research community and content producers into a single coordinated programme – the kind of cross-stakeholder alignment that DRM rollouts elsewhere have shown to be decisive.
DRM Carries BeiDou Corrections
Later in the same forum came a key technical paper. Wang Feifei, Associate Professor at Communication University of China’s State Key Laboratory of Media Convergence and Communication, presented the first public results from a programme of field trials that began in November 2025. The trials, run jointly with the NRTA’s Radio Station Administration Bureau and several other partners, explored whether a DRM signal could carry RTCM differential corrections to deliver centimetre-level BeiDou positioning in areas without 4G or 5G coverage.
The results confirmed that it could. Five scenarios were tested across three phases. A 15-hour vessel-borne trial on the Yangtze estuary recorded a fixed-solution rate of 99.7 percent, with differential data latency of 10 to 15 seconds. A parallel vehicle-borne trial across varied terrain recorded availability above 95 percent, while a control test using cellular-based network RTK lost its fix offshore.
The implications extend beyond a single experiment. By turning a broadcast carrier into a delivery channel for both audio programming and high-precision positioning data, DRM transmitters can function as part of national positioning infrastructure in areas where mobile networks are not viable.
China’s DRM Supply Chain
The exhibition floor demonstrated that end-to-end DRM solutions from Chinese vendors are now commercially ready. Beijing BBEF Electronics Technology Group, Shaanxi Xuntian Broadcasting Technology and Shaanxi Ruyi Broadcast and Television Technique each launched new DRM-capable transmitter product lines covering low, medium and high-power applications.
Chengdu Newglee Technology presented a comprehensive portfolio spanning the entire signal chain, including a DRM media encoder, modulator, retrofit solutions, and integrated receiver, monitoring and emergency broadcasting systems. Its in-vehicle Type 5 SDR platform supports DRM, DAB, CDR, AM and FM on a single software stack, highlighting the maturity of the ecosystem.
The BeiDou trial results, the new shortwave initiative, and the emergence of a complete domestic supply chain all point to a clear transition. CCBN 2026 marks a phase change, with the focus shifting from validation to large-scale deployment of DRM across China.
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