Arbitron Inc. (NYSE:ARB) today announced that Midwest Television, Inc. has signed a multi-year contract for Portable People Meter radio ratings services for KFMB-AM and KFMB-FM. This agreement will take effect as and when Arbitron commercializes the new audience ratings technology in San Diego.
“This advance in ratings gathering technology signals a watershed moment for our industry,” said Gina Landau, Vice President and General Manager, KFMB-AM/FM. “The advent of more accurate audience reporting, particularly at an unprecedented time of downturn, will make a tremendous difference in our ability to compete for Radio’s fair share of total ad dollars in the future. The KFMB Stations are pleased to be among the first in the San Diego Market to secure PPM service.”
Over the next three years, Arbitron is scheduled to deploy the Portable People Meter in the top 50 markets in place of the paper diary method that the company has used to collect radio audience estimates since 1965.
About Midwest Television
Midwest Television, Inc., headquartered in Champaign, Illinois, purchased KFMB-AM, FM and TV in 1964. KFMB studios were then located at 5th and Ash Streets in downtown San Diego. KFMB moved to its present location in Kearny Mesa in 1977.
KFMB is the only broadcaster to offer the community two radio stations and a TV station. On the AM dial, KFMB 760 Talk Radio informs and entertains listeners with some of the city’s most popular and controversial talk personalities. 100.7 JACK FM is one of the first stations in America to adopt the new Adult Hits music format. KFMB-TV is home to the CBS network, News 8 – the #1 rated news station in San Diego.
About Arbitron
Arbitron Inc. (NYSE:ARB) is a media and marketing research firm serving radio broadcasters, cable companies, advertisers, advertising agencies and outdoor advertising companies. 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. The Company has developed the Portable People Meter, a new technology for media and marketing research.
Arbitron's marketing and business units are supported by its research and technology organization, located in Columbia, Maryland. Arbitron has approximately 2,100 employees; its executive offices are located in New York City.
Through its Scarborough Research joint venture with The Nielsen Company, Arbitron also provides media and marketing research services to the broadcast television, newspaper and online industries.
Portable People MeterTM and PPMTM are marks of Arbitron Inc.
Arbitron Forward-Looking Statements
This press release contains forward d-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. The statements regarding Arbitron Inc. and its subsidiaries ("we," "our," "Arbitron" or the "Company") in this document 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 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, in no particular order, whether we will be able to:
successfully implement the rollout of the Portable People Meter service;
renew contracts with large customers as they expire;
successfully execute our business strategies, including entering into potential acquisition, joint-venture or other material third-party agreements;
effectively manage the impact of any further ownership shifts in the radio and advertising agency industries;
respond to rapidly changing technological needs of our customer base, including creating new proprietary software systems and new customer products and services that meet these needs in a timely manner;
successfully manage the impact on our business of any economic downturn generally and in the advertising market in particular;
successfully manage the impact on costs of data collection due to lower respondent cooperation in surveys, privacy concerns, consumer trends, technology changes and/or government regulations;
successfully design, recruit, and maintain PPM panels that appropriately balance research quality, panel size and operational cost;
successfully develop and implement technology solutions to measure multi-media and advertising in an increasingly competitive environment; and
successfully obtain and/or maintain Media Rating Council accreditation for our audience measurement services.
Additional important factors known to Arbitron that could cause actual results to differ materially from our forward-looking statements 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 1A. RISK FACTORS" in Arbitron's Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2006.