More from GCap execs at the Radio Festival, and the radio firm's CEO Ralph Bernard has said he did once discuss the possibility of merging his company with the radio division of rival EMAP, but "only for 30 seconds". According to the Guardian, Bernard told the industry event: "I was amazed at the speculation about us and EMAP. It seems to have come from a 30-second chat with [EMAP chief] Tom Moloney several months ago. We did say at one point 'this is the sort of thing we should talk about'. But literally we were walking out [of a restaurant] in Charlotte Street, he went one way, I went the other, and then he left". That conversation is, of course, even less relevant now given that Moloney left EMAP back in May.
That said, Bernard, like most of his equivalents in other radio firms, is keen for further changes in radio ownership laws to allow further consolidation in the industry. He continued: "It is bonkers that you can have a big organisation like ITV consolidating in the way that it has, but commercial radio groups scattered around the country are forced to stay apart because of the way the structure was set up in the first place. We need to have a way of reducing costs and putting the money behind the microphone so we can compete with our principal competitor, the BBC."