International Datacasting Corporation (TSX:IDC) has been awarded a US$5.3 million contract by National Public Radio (NPR) to update and refurbish the Public Radio Satellite System(R) (PRSS(R)). The PRSS transmits programming to more than 800 public radio stations throughout the United States. NPR's Distribution Division has managed system since the PRSS' inception in 1979.

The project — known as PRSS Forward — will make significant upgrades to the PRSS. IDC provided the infrastructure currently in use and will be updating the current Network Operations Center (NOC) equipment as well as augmenting it with IDC's Production Manager to provide advanced functionality for region-specific programming. IDC will also be delivering an upgrade to nexgen satellite receivers that will provide PRSS stations with a number of advantages. The SFX4104 Pro Audio model includes: dual tuners (to receive content from multiple satellites), DVB-S2 for bandwidth efficiency, integrated store and forward capability (with an expanded hard drive/server built in) as well as support for four live stereo streams.