London, July 1 2009: The international arm of NHK, Japan's renowned public service broadcaster, has recently contracted for an increased range of services with WRN, the London based broadcasting and transmission company.

Starting from the summer season of 2009, WRN is providing new platforms for Radio Japan's Arabic services to be heard in the Middle East via a 1000kW Medium Wave station on 1377kHz AM, and on FM for the Palestinian Territories, parts of Israel and Jordan. This adds to WRN's existing agreement to place NHK's Arabic programming on its own station "Sawt Al-Alam" (Arabic for "Voice of the World") which is an aggregation of programming from leading world broadcasters and is available on the Arabsat, Hot Bird and Nilesat satellite services.

Mr Yuki Sakagami, Associate Director of NHK's International Planning & Broadcasting Department said, "Within current media development in the world of international broadcasting, NHK World Radio Japan is now taking the initiative to broadcast its programmes on the most suitable media, including FM and Medium Wave, in each target area, and commencing these new transmission platforms in the Middle East is one such example".

NHK's Russian language programming is now heard on WRN's Russian channel "Vsimirniya Radioset" (which is Russian for World Radio Network) on both satellite and locally on 738 AM (Medium Wave) in Moscow. Karl Miosga, Chairman of WRN, said "Radio Japan adds the new dimension of a Japanese perspective to the programming we offer in Russia and we are delighted they join us as a partner broadcaster with their extremely high quality content".

Meanwhile in South Asia, Radio Japan in Bengali, Hindi and Urdu is now available via one of the shortwave relay facilities offered by WRN. Jeff Cohen, who looks after shortwave transmission at WRN, says, "Though use of shortwave has been declining in recent years in western nations it is still essential for reaching Asia and this is attested by the high demand for frequency spectrum in the region".

Atsushi Terauchi, Senior Manager at NHK's International Planning & Broadcasting Department, spoke of the general widening of NHK's use of relay facilities, "It is essential that the 18 language services of Radio Japan from NHK World, reach the highest possible audience worldwide. So we constantly review transmission platforms and add new ways that audiences can tune to our programmes".

David Treadway, Managing Director of WRN, expressed his delight at the new business with NHK, "We really appreciate the confidence of Japan's public broadcaster in WRN shown by this significant increase in the global transmission services we provide".

For further information about WRN please contact: Sophie Wilson, Head of Sales and Business Development, WRN Tel: +44 20 7896 4022 Fax: + 44 20 7896 9007 Email: [email protected]

For further information about NHK please contact: Atsushi Terauchi, Senior Manager International Planning & Broadcasting Department, NHK Tel: +81 3 5455 5866 Fax: +81 3 3466 7789 Email: [email protected]

About WRN
WRN is a leading international television and radio transmission company offering a comprehensive portfolio of broadcast services including satellite uplink and capacity services, TV ingest and playout, Web / IPTV services, station start-up consultancy and channel management, EPG brokerage, studio facilities, DRM Digital Radio and FM / AM / SW airtime brokerage. Headquartered in London, WRN's clients include international and national public broadcasters, commercial and community stations, satellite bouquet operators and cable companies. For more information visit www.wrn.org  

About NHK
NHK operates international television, radio and Internet services NHK World Radio Japan is NHK's international radio broadcasting service, broadcasting world-wide in 18 languages, including Japanese, English, Arabic, French, Russian and Spanish. NHK aims to provide both domestic and international news to the world accurately and promptly along with recent information on Asia from various perspectives, making the best use of NHK's global network. NHK presents broadcasts with great accuracy and speed on many aspects of Japanese culture and lifestyles, recent developments in society and politics, the latest scientific and industrial trends, and Japan's role and opinions regarding important global issues. For more information visit www.nhk.or.jp