4ro Case Study

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The station was launched on 2 July 1932[2] and was the second station in Rockhampton - the first being 4RK, now ABC Capricornia. The opening of 4RO resulted in Rockhampton being the first regional town in Queensland, to have two stations. Coverage of Races and Football were among the very first items to be featured on 4RO's earliest transmissions on 2 July 1932. The station was officially opened that night by Rockhampton Mayor, JT Lee. 4RO's first studio was built on the corner of East and Denham Streets in Rockhampton's CBD. The studio was on the second floor of the building. An aerial that strung between two masts on the back of the building was responsible for transmitting a power of 200 watts. In 1953, new transmitters of two kilowatts…show more content…
In 1982, 4RO opened a new transmission site at Port Alma, south of Rockhampton, that started transmitting a power of five kilowatts. The old transmitter at Pink Lily is now used by 4RO's Gladstone based sister station 4CC to broadcast their Rockhampton service on 1584 AM. In 1996, 4RO was bought by Reg Grundy's RG Capital Radio. In 2000, RG Capital launched an FM radio station in Rockhampton called Sea FM. The Sea FM studios were set up inside the 4RO building in Victoria Parade. At the same time, DMG Regional Radio, launched 4CC's FM sister station Hot FM, to rival Sea FM. The Hot FM studios were built in an office in Quay Street in Rockhampton. In 2004, RG Capital Radio and DMG Regional Radio merged to form Macquarie Regional Radioworks, which meant the four major commercial stations broadcasting in the Rockhampton/Gladstone market were owned by the same company. The merger meant that the newly formed company was required by Australian law to offload two radio stations, as one company cannot own more than two radio stations in the same market. As a result, 4RO and 4CC were offloaded to Canberra-based Prime Media Group. Around the same time, Prime also acquired a number of other regional stations after similar events occurred in other regional radio markets - Zinc and 4CA in Cairns, Zinc and Mix FM in Townsville, Zinc and 4MK in Mackay, and Zinc and Hot 91 on the Sunshine
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