Sun FM is a radio station serving

Sunderland Sunderland () is a port city in Tyne and Wear, England. It is the City of Sunderland's administrative centre and in the Historic counties of England, historic county of County of Durham, Durham. The city is from Newcastle-upon-Tyne and is on t ...

and large parts of

County Durham County Durham ( ), officially simply Durham,UK General Acts 1997 c. 23Lieutenancies Act 1997 Schedule 1(3). From legislation.gov.uk, retrieved 6 April 2022. is a ceremonial county in North East England.North East Assembly �About North East E ...

in England and owned by

Nation Broadcasting Nation Broadcasting is a British media company headquartered in the Vale of Glamorgan, Wales. It currently owns and operates twelve Independent Local Radio stations across the United Kingdom. History Originally known as Town and Country Broa ...

. It is also available in

Tyne and Wear Tyne and Wear () is a metropolitan county in North East England, situated around the mouths of the rivers Tyne and Wear. It was created in 1974, by the Local Government Act 1972, along with five metropolitan boroughs of Gateshead, Newcastl ...

. Sun FM broadcasts on FM, as well as online. The station plays a mix of contemporary and classic

popular music Popular music is music with wide appeal that is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no musical training.Popular Music. (2015). ''Fun ...

alongside local news and travel. As of September 2022, the station broadcasts to a weekly audience of 28,000, according to RAJAR.

History

Wear FM

The station was launched by the Sunderland Community Radio Station in 1990 and broadcast as Wear FM, based at the

University of Sunderland , mottoeng = Sweetly absorbing knowledge , established = 1901 - Sunderland Technical College1969 - Sunderland Polytechnic1992 - University of Sunderland (gained university status) , staff = , chancellor = Emeli ...

. Wear FM gained international acclaim for its community programming and social inclusion and won the

Sony Award The Radio Academy Awards, started in 1983, were the most prestigious awards in the British radio industry. For most of their existence, they were run by ZAFER Associates, but in latter years were brought under the control of The Radio Academy ...

for UK Radio Station of the Year in 1992. Wear FM ceased transmissions in 1995 when it was taken over by the Minster Sound Group, who relaunched the station as Sun City FM. The station's studios in the Foster Building were taken over by the University of Sunderland.

Sun City FM

Sun City took over when Wear FM ceased broadcasting in 1995. Sun City 103.4's operator was financially penalised in that year by the

Radio Authority Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmitt ...

for not fully adhering to elements of their Promise of Performance.

Sun FM

A sale to Border Radio Holdings followed with the new owners rebranding the station as Sun FM. In January 1999 Brian Lister joined as managing director. Sun FM became part of the

Capital Radio Group GCap Media was a British commercial radio company formed from the merger of the Capital Radio Group and GWR Group. The merger was completed in May 2005. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange and was a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. O ...

when they acquired Border Radio in April 2000 as part of a three-way deal with

Granada TV ITV Granada, formerly known as Granada Television, is the ITV franchisee for the North West of England and Isle of Man. From 1956 to 1968 it broadcast to both the north west and Yorkshire but only on weekdays as ABC Weekend Television was it ...

. In March 2001, Radio Investments Limited purchased Sun FM and its parent company Bucks Broadcasting. This sale also included the other group station, Mix 96 in

Aylesbury Aylesbury ( ) is the county town of Buckinghamshire, South East England. It is home to the Roald Dahl Children's Gallery, David Tugwell`s house on Watermead and the Waterside Theatre. It is in central Buckinghamshire, midway between High Wy ...

. Radio Investments later became known as

The Local Radio Company The Local Radio Company was a British media company, based in Redruth, Cornwall, that owned ten independent local radio stations in the UK. After takeover talks with UTV Media, UKRD Group and Hallwood Financial, UKRD acquired the majority sha ...

. In June 2009, The Local Radio Company was itself acquired by

UKRD Group The UKRD Group Ltd was a British media company that owned 15 commercial radio stations in the United Kingdom. The name originates from UK Radio Developments. Since its acquisition in March 2019, it has been run as a subsidiary of Bauer Radio. H ...

. In 2018, UKRD Group sold Sun FM to Wales-based radio operator

. In March 2020, Nation Broadcasting bought neighbouring stations Durham Radio & Alpha Radio and merged them with Sun FM, thus enlarging the broadcast area to include large parts of County Durham.

Current programming

Today, Sun FM plays songs primarily from the year 2000 onwards, with the occasional 80’s and 90’s songs, and provides local news, sport and information on 102.8 FM, 103.2 FM, 103.4 FM & 106.8 FM from its Sunderland based studios, reaching southwards through its designated broadcast area to Washington, Ryhope, Houghton-Le-Spring and Murton, and outwards to Newcastle, South Shields, Chester-Le-Street, large parts of County Durham and Darlington.

Transmission

Sun FM's transmission facility is located on farmland at Haining, to the south-west of Sunderland. It transmits with an ERP of 300 watts.Sun FM (United Kingdom)
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References

External links

* {{Radio stations in North East England The Local Radio Company Nation Broadcasting

Sun The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...

Sunderland Radio stations established in 1990