A Sussex man with a history of ruling the radio waves has set his sights on the internet.
Eugene Perera's radio career spans more than 20 years. He was the founder and launch director behind Brighton's Surf FM and Manchester and Yorkshire dance station Kiss FM.
Now he has set up Radio Revolution to build radio stations for the internet and other emerging platforms such as digital satellite and digital audio broadcasting (Dab).
Mr Perera said: "The potential for internet radio is enormous. We build a unique station for each site and this adds so much to the web presence.
"The stations can be used both as a way to generate extra e-commerce and advertising revenue and as a method of attracting visitors back to the site time and time again."
Radio Revolution has been working with Hove-based web and games development company Babel Media to build the audio player graphical interface and database technology required to deliver the broadcast content.
Mr Perera said: "To use one of our internet radio stations, visitors click on a button which launches an audio player. This opens a new separate window displaying information such as the name and title of the music playing. It does not take up much space on the screen.
"The interface has buttons for selecting functions such as Buy Now, which allows people to buy the CD they are listening to and have it delivered direct to their door within days.
"With traditional radio if you hear a track you like you have to wait to the end of the song to hear who it was by, remember the details and go to a record shop at a later date."
The radio window can be minimised on the computer screen, leaving the broadcast playing while the surfer goes off to look at other sites or works with offline applications such as word processing.
Mr Perera said: "Between the music the station broadcasts adverts, promotional features and information about the client company, all of which encourage visitors to go back to the site.
"Increasing the rate of return visits is key to a successful web site. Likewise, people listening to a track they like will hang on to hear the end, just as shoppers linger in fashion outlets featuring music carefully targeted to their lifestyle tastes.
"This creates a feeling of brand affinity between the consumer and the website."
The station's music content comes from an automated playout system which schedules tracks from a pre-defined play list. Speech-based content is produced weekly by Radio Revolution and interspersed between tracks.
Mr Perera said: "We're in the business of 'sonic branding' where the radio content we produce for each station is carefully designed to match the client's branding and business strategies. The programming is set up in advance for ease of production but there's no technical obstacle to stop us altering content immediately if a client has sudden news to flag up to listeners."
The company's first station is for a subsidiary of First Leisure, Applebelly.com, which is targeting the 18 to 25 club market. Applebelly has created a network of 150 clubs across the country with a combined monthly capacity of three million people. The company has called on Radio Revolution to provide a dance station to link their followers on a web site due to go live at the end of April.
Jason Nicklin, content director of Applebelly, said: "Applebelly is all about taking the fun of real world clubbing online.
"Music is a key area of entertainment on our site and online radio lengthens our users' visits to the site and adds another dimension to the experience.
"We looked at several different companies to provide programming for Applebelly.fm but Radio Revolution immediately understood our market and offered up the most fun proposal. This has resulted in tight professional programming that blows away pretend internet radio stations that are, in fact, just looping music."
Radio Revolution and Babel Media are sharing premises in a warehouse-style operation at the Hove Business Centre to build a close team to work on the new stations.
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