This story has been updated; see note at bottom.
Ford Motor Company has filed a patent for new technology designed to support AM radio in electric vehicles through a hybrid solution, as first reported by the website Ford Authority.
According to Ford Authority’s Brett Foote, Ford filed the patent in 2023 and it was published on March 27. The patent is available to view here. Radio World has reached out to Ford for further comment on its plans for the technology.
The core idea behind the system’s concept is to avoid being bound to a single radio tuner. Instead, Ford describes a communication system that relies on a remote vehicle entertainment server to deliver content.
“Specifically, the communication system generally includes at least one tuner (e.g., FM tuner, cellular receiver, and/or GNSS receiver, among others),” the patent says. “However, a tuner is not provided for a designated radio transmission medium, such as an AM tuner for receiving the AM frequency band.”
Ford also describes a digital AM radio module capable of obtaining content for a single station from multiple sources, including cellular networks, over-the-air broadcast and V2X (vehicle-to-everything) communication.
The patent outlines what happens when a tuner is “unresponsive to a first radio transmission medium.” In such cases, the vehicle sends a “radio content request” to a remote server, which then receives the station content from a source and stores it in a staging memory, before transmitting it to the vehicle. This would likely involve streaming the station’s live feed.
The system can switch sources dynamically if “the quality of the content from the first source degrades.”
Additionally, the patent notes that the system may support standards such as ATSC broadcast, which suggests broader applications for digital radio delivery.
If the desired content is unavailable from any source, the receiver will notify the user accordingly.
Ford Authority noted that AM functionality was removed from the 2023 edition of the F-150 Lightning, despite having been previously standard. Its decision was based on the concern the drivetrains of electric vehicles interfere with AM radio. However, following public and regulatory pressure, Ford restored AM radio to its 2023 EVs and included it in its 2024 lineup.
Now, Ford Authority reports, this new patent presents a potential long-term solution to mitigate AM radio interference in future EVs — while still offering access to AM content.
Ed. Note: The original version of this story reported that Ford had removed AM functionality from the 2023 F-150 due to the AM receiver interfering with the drivetrains of EVs. Based on prior Ford Authority reporting, it was the opposite — the drivetrain was causing interference to its AM receiver.
