XM Radio is owned by DirecTV (which is owned by Hughes, which is owned by General Motors)... It was supposed to be operational by years end, but there was a satellite "mis-launch" this week, so that may be put back a bit.

There is a competitor called Sirus. Both systems are very similar, but Sirus will be operational by as early as May of this year. Ford and several other car makers have backed Sirus.

So, both systems will have their own camp of manufactuers and car makers supporting the service. But, within 1-2 years, aftermarket recievers will be able to receive BOTH services (depending on which the user pays a subscription fee too.)

Yes, the systems are only going to be for the US market, but that may either expand or similar systems will arrise in Europe and Japan.

What is great about empeg is that if the module is an add-on, people in the US could get one module and users in Europe could get another...

I was thinking the other day how cool it would be for empeg to have this.