Ipsos Italian Radio Contract Extended

Ipsos has been awarded a further year's contract to track Italian radio audiences, using its mobile radio audience measurement system MediaCell.

The firm has recruited a panel of 4,000 individuals aged 14+, whose listening habits are measured passively through MediaCell. The system uses software on a mobile phone to 'listen' for inaudible signals inserted by a radio station at the point of transmission, and only requires that respondents carry their mobile phones for the signals to be detected.

MediaCell has already been deployed in the UK, as well as in Italy, and the firm is planning to roll the system out to a further ten countries in 2013 - across Europe, Central America, the Middle East and Asia.

The initial one-year Italian contract was awarded to the group last year. Ipsos MediaCT Global Development Director Jim Ford (pictured) says the extension, combined with the company's Rajar-funded panel in London, continues to build on its 'respondent-focused approach' to passive electronic broadcast audience measurement.

Web site: www.ipsos.com .