After Mediacorp Singapore’s Expat Radio 96.3 XFM stopped broadcasting on September 30, its Hindi channel – Radio Masti, continues to reach listeners through live streaming.
The decision to shut down the decade old XFM was announced in a statement in June.
When asked if the licence was revoked due to the small listenership numbers, at that time Mediacorp said that Expat Radio 96.3XFM serves a niche audience, and was not designed to “reach the listenership levels of the mass market radio stations”.
It added that the review of the station and frequency was driven by new technologies and evolving radio listenership preferences.
The Japanese channel on XFM had been a part of the frequency since its launch and the Hindi station Radio Masti was introduced in 2009.
Radio Masti, a niche three-hour evening drive time station playing Bollywood music with news and information from across India, Singapore and the globe had a listener base of about 1.2million listeners across all south East Asian countries.
It was the sole Hindi station for expat Indians, Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, Sri Lankans, Nepalese, Malays and many other communities.
It was also the only non 24-hour station to be awarded by Mediacorp across several categories at the Radio Awards.
After making several efforts to figure out options to continue on another frequency, the management of Radio Masti decided to continue by establishing their live studio streaming through a dedicated app on android and iOS.
Now rebranded as Radio Masti 24×7, the station has gone live on Android as well as iOS as the first live Hindi 24×7 radio-on-apps in Singapore from October 1.
The daily 5-8 pm live show has been extended to 4-9 pm and has also introduced retro music, devotional songs, regional music hour besides regular features like request shows, traffic updates, weather updates from India and Singapore.
According to Renuka Arora Bhagat from Radio Masti: “It was a pleasant revelation that 87 percent of Radio Masti listeners were always app driven. Therefore to move them from one app to another isn’t being perceived as a challenge. Past relationships with clients and value derived from Radio Masti promotions has led all clients to continue their support. Social Media marketing, Visual and print adverts continue to reach out to target audience to ensure listeners continue to enjoy seamless entertainment- with increased hours.”