VentureBeat

Digital Radio Express, a developer of technology to digitize the FM spectrum, wants to change how radio works. And it’s just brought in up to $3.3 million in its first round of venture funding to do so.

The Milpitas, Calif. company has developed a technology called FMeXtra, which allows for multiple digital programs to be broadcast over the same station at the same time. That means the company could create vast new real estate on the airwaves for public and commercial stations. When listeners tune into their favorite radio station, they’ll be able to select from various substations to listen to within that station.

That’s not all. Digtial Radio Express also says that by providing whole new capabilities for radio, it’ll change the way manufacturers design new radio models. The company’s web site explains that it’ll enable “real-time video clips, navigation system updates, continuous one-button multilingual traffic, news, and weather; services that have real draw and instant impact.”

The technology is currently in very limited usage in the United States, with only several dozen stations using the technology.

FMeXtra doesn’t truly have direct competition. The closest technology would be HD Radio by iBiquity, but that’s a bit like comparing apples to oranges. The two technologies are compatible and can coexist. HD Radio is designed to improve audio quality, while FMeXtra is made specifically to multicast separate programs within the same station.

That said, FMeXtra is far behind HD Radio terms of market share in the United States. HD Radio is now used by over 1,600 stations in the US, and provides most of the features that FMeXtra does, including multicasting, yet not at the same quality.

This round of investment was led by Artiman Ventures.