Broadcast Data Systems (also known as Nielsen BDS, BDS or Luminate BDS) was a service that tracks radio, television and internet airplay of songs. The service, which is a unit of

MRC Data Luminate Data, LLC (formerly MRC Data and P-MRC Data) is a provider of music and entertainment data. Established as a joint-venture in 2020, it brought together Nielsen Music, Alpha Data (formerly BuzzAngle Music) and Variety Business Intellig ...

, is a contributing factor to North American

charts A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can represent t ...

published by co-owned magazine ''

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

'', including the

Billboard Hot 100 The ''Billboard'' Hot 100, also known as simply the Hot 100, is the music industry standard record chart in the United States for songs, published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine. Chart rankings are based on sales (physical and digital), ...

and

Canadian Hot 100 The Canadian Hot 100 is a music industry record chart in Canada for songs, published weekly by ''Billboard (magazine), Billboard'' magazine. It was launched on the issue dated March 31, 2007 as the standard record chart in Canada; a new chart ...

, when combined with sales and streaming data from Soundscan. BDS monitors airplay on more than 2,000 radio stations, satellite radio, and cable music channels across the United States (including Puerto Rico), Canada, and Mexico. Luminate distributes BDS airplay data in their suite of music data products, including Music Connect, BDSRadio, BDS RealTime, ENcore and Musictracking. From August 2006 to its final June 2009 publication, BDS also provided chart data for '' R&R'' after Nielsen acquired the trade. On September 10, 2009, the website ''Radio-Info.com'' struck a partnership with Nielsen BDS to provide radio airplay charts and related data for over 20 formats.

History

BDS was founded as ''Broadcast Recognition Systems'' by Robert Uhlmann and Hal Oppenheimer, in 1982. Uhlmann developed the idea for automating airplay recognition after his experience working in the music industry in Florida. After returning to Kansas City, Uhlmann partnered with financier Hal Oppenheimer to start the company and develop the technology for tracking airplay data, which was originally developed to detect submarines by military contractors in Washington D.C. In 1986, BDS debuted their revolutionary audio recognition technology in front of the

Recording Industry Association of America The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) is a trade organization that represents the music recording industry in the United States. Its members consist of record labels and distributors that the RIAA says "create, manufacture, and/o ...

as a new method of monitoring radio airplay of songs and commercial advertising. Prior to the debut of their tracking system the music industry relied on self-reported playlists from radio stations. BDS airplay data was first used on a Billboard chart on January 20, 1990, when Billboard magazine published their newly revised

Hot Country Singles Hot Country Songs is a chart published weekly by ''Billboard'' magazine in the United States. This 50-position chart lists the most popular country music songs, calculated weekly by collecting airplay data along with digital sales and streaming. ...

chart. On November 30, 1991, Billboard published the first

chart using airplay data from BDS. Since its debut, BDS has become the standard for the radio and music industry because of its accuracy of detecting, tracking and monitoring songs, thus eliminating the use of reporting and call-outs to trades and record labels when it comes to adding and testing tracks. The method has also helped tracks that only received airplay (songs that are not released as singles) become major hits, especially in ''Billboards Hot 100 chart, where several radio-only tracks have reached the top spot. In 1994,

SESAC SESAC is a for-profit performance-rights organization in the United States. Founded in 1930 as the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers, it is the second-oldest performance-rights organization in the United States.

became the first

Performance Rights Organization A performance rights organisation (PRO), also known as a performing rights society, provides intermediary functions, particularly collection of royalties, between copyright holders and parties who wish to use copyrighted works ''publicly'' in lo ...

to use data from BDS. BDS was acquired by

parent company BPI Communications. In 1994, BPI Communications along with BDS were sold to Dutch media conglomerate Verenigde Nederlandse Uitgeverijen (VNU). After VNU was reorganized and renamed the

Nielsen Company Nielsen Holdings plc (or Nielsen) is an American media audience measurement firm. Nielsen operates in over 100 countries and employs approximately 15,000 people worldwide. For most of its history, the company was known for its two subsidiarie ...

in 2007, BDS became known as Nielsen BDS. In December 2019,

Valence Media Valence or valency may refer to: Science *Valence (chemistry), a measure of an element's combining power with other atoms *Valence electron, electrons in the outer shell of an atom's energy levels *Valence quarks, those quarks within a hadron th ...

, the parent company of ''Billboard'', acquired Nielsen's music data business to establish its data division, MRC Data. The acquisition reunited BDS with ''Billboard'' for the first time since its spin-off to E5 Global Media from Nielsen Business Media. The purchase included Soundscan, BDS, and Music360. In October 2020, MRC and Penske Media combined their data businesses to form a joint venture, named P-MRC Data. The joint venture would combine MRC Data, Alpha Data, and Variety Business Intelligence. P-MRC Data rebranded as Luminate in March 2022. The service was retired in September 2022. As a replacement, Luminate partnered with

Mediabase Mediabase is a music industry service that monitors radio station airplay in 180 US and Canadian markets. Mediabase publishes music charts and data based on the most played songs on terrestrial and satellite radio, and provides in-depth analytic ...

for tracking radio airplay data.

References

{{Nielsen Mass media companies established in 1982 Entertainment companies established in 1982 American companies established in 1982 1982 establishments in Missouri Companies based in Kansas City, Missouri Promotion and marketing communications Market research companies of the United States