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FM104, ‘Dublin’s hit radio station’, serves the greater Dublin region, including parts of counties Kildare, Meath and Wicklow. The station, first known as ‘Capital Radio’, was established in 1989 by a consortium led by magazine executive Mike Hogan under the company name Capital Radio Ltd. The station first broadcast from the St. Stephen’s Greene shopping centre in Dublin City Centre.

Capital Radio was one of 24 local stations created by the 1988 Radio and Television Act which ended RTE’s monopoly. It was originally licensed by the Independent Radio and Television Commission (IRTC) and was the first independent radio station to go live in the country. The station name was changed from Capital Radio to FM104 in 1992.

In addition to contemporary music, the station provides news and sports content. Popular shows include the morning show, ‘Strawberry Alarm Clock’, the ‘10-3 show with Saoirse Long’, and ‘Select Irish’ with Max Kane, which presents new Irish talent. Several shows are also available in podcast format, and the station provides news content and live streaming services on its website and the Onic Player App.

In terms of popularity, FM014 has a strong listener base. According to its website, 241,000 listeners tune in every week. Further, the Joint National Research Listenership Survey (JNLR) found that FM104 reaches approximately 7.4% of the Dublin radio market.

The station was purchased from original shareholders Dermot Hanrahan (10% of shares), Maurice Cassidy (6%), Ulick McVeddy (3%), and lesser shareholders Pearse Farrell, Greg Sparks, and Jim Aiken by Scottish Radio Holdings in 2004; however, SRH sold out to Emap only one year later in 2005. In 2007, the station again changed hands when Communicorp purchased the entirety of Emap’s Irish radio holdings. Competition Authority approval of the Communicorp acquisition was conditional on the immediate resale of FM104 because Communcorp already owned a leading station in the Dublin market (98FM). Thus, Communcicorp sold FM104 to Belfast-based UTV Media in a deal worth €52m.. UTV’s Irish holdings were later rebranded to Wireless Group. In 2016, the Wireless Group’s UK and Ireland radio holdings were purchased for £UK220.3m by News UK & Ireland, which is ultimately owned by US-based News Corporation (News Corp). News Corp’s largest single shareholder is Lachlan Murdoch.. In 2025, News UK & Ireland rebranded its Wireless Ireland Radio subsidiary as Onic.

In addition to FM104, Onic also operates six other Irish radio stations, including Limerick Live 95, Q102, and LMFM in Louth and Meath. Onic also operates the commercial sales house, Urban Media, which works with Galway Bay FM and WLR. Onic employs more than 200 staff members in Ireland, and their stations reach 775,000 listeners weekly (representing 10.6% of the Irish radio market). In the most recent year for which financial results are available (2024) Onic (then “Wireless”) revenues for their Irish operations were worth €23.37m, a €1m over the previous year.

Key Facts

Audience Share7.4% (County Dublin Market, JNLR January-December 2025)
Ownership TypePrivate
Content TypeFree
Data Publicly Available
ownership data is easily available from other sources, e. g. public registries etc.
Operating CompanyCapital Radio Productions Limited
Identifier: Capital Radio Productions Ltd. Company Number: IE138888

Ownership

Ownership Structure

FM104 (Capital Radio Productions Limited) is operated by Onic, which was previously known as Wireless Ireland (ROI) Limited but rebranded in March 2025. Onic is owned by News Broadcasting, a subsidiary of News UK & Ireland, which is itself a wholly owned subsidiary of US-based News Corporation (News Corp), a global media conglomerate listed on the Nasdaq Stock Market.
News Corp operates a dual-class share structure, in which Class B shares carry voting rights and Class A shares do not. In total, Class B shares represent approximately 33% of all shares outstanding and Class A shares the remaining 67%, but because only Class B shares carry votes, voting control is disproportionate to economic ownership.
As of September 2025, LGC Holdco LLC — a vehicle controlled by Lachlan Murdoch, son of News Corp founder Rupert Murdoch — holds approximately 33% of all Class B shares, representing around 11% of total shares across both classes. However, given the fragmentation of all other shareholdings, this translates into an effective voting power of approximately 39% at shareholder meetings, making LGC Holdco the single largest and most influential shareholder in the company. Voting control rests solely with Lachlan Murdoch through his appointed managing director.
The remaining shares are held by a broad range of institutional investors. The largest are Vanguard Group (~9% of total shares), BlackRock (~7%), State Street (~6%), and Independent Franchise Partners (~5%), alongside other asset managers and retail investors. These institutional shareholders hold primarily Class A shares, meaning their economic stakes are not matched by equivalent voting power.

Voting RightsVoting rights at News Corp are governed by a dual-class share structure, in which Class B shares carry full voting rights and are predominantly controlled by the Murdoch family, while Class A shares carry no voting rights. As of September 2025, Murdoch-affiliated entities hold approximately 72 million Class B shares, representing around 39% of all Class B shares outstanding, giving the family effective control over the company.
Individual Owner
Group / Individual Owner
  • Free Float

    The remaining shares in News Corp are publicly traded on the Nasdaq Stock Market, where they are held by a large and diverse range of institutional investors, asset managers, mutual funds, and retail investors. Collectively, these publicly traded shares represent approximately 89% of total shares outstanding, though the vast majority are Class A shares carrying no voting rights. The largest institutional shareholders among this publicly traded float are Vanguard Group (~9% of total shares) and BlackRock (~7%), which together hold approximately 16% of News Corp's total share capital. These are followed by State Street Corporation (~6%) and Independent Franchise Partners (~5%). A notable feature of this institutional ownership landscape is what is sometimes described as circular or interlocking ownership. Vanguard, BlackRock and State Street — the three largest index-fund managers in the world — are not only major shareholders in News Corp but are also significant shareholders in each other. Vanguard is the largest shareholder in State Street, holding approximately 13% of that company, and also holds around 9% of BlackRock. BlackRock in turn holds shares in State Street. This means that the same pool of underlying investors — the millions of pension funds, retirement savers and institutional clients whose money these firms manage — has indirect exposure to News Corp through multiple channels simultaneously. It is important to note, however, that Vanguard, BlackRock and State Street hold these shares in a fiduciary capacity on behalf of their underlying clients, not as owners in their own right. Their economic interest in News Corp is therefore indirect, and their voting behaviour at shareholder meetings is governed by their own stewardship policies rather than by any single controlling interest. Because they hold almost exclusively Class A shares, their combined ~22% economic stake in News Corp carries no voting rights, limiting their ability to influence corporate decisions despite the scale of their financial exposure.
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Operating Company

Facts

Founding Year1989

Like many Irish radio stations, FM104’s (Capital Radio Limited) founding coincided with Ireland’s broadcast regulator ending the national broadcaster’s (RTE) monopoly and issuing local radio licences. Indeed, Capital Radio was the first independent radio station to go live in the country.

Founder
  • Mike Hogan

    Mike Hogan is a media executive with decades of experience in the print magazine and radio industries. He began his career working at pirate stations, including Sunshine and Nova. He later led a consortium that founded Capital Radio after the 1988 Radio and Television Act ended RTE’s monopoly. Hogan also owned the Hoson Publications Group, a publisher for more than 35 print magazines, including Boyzone, Deadline, and High Ball. In 2000, Hogan was convicted of publishing ads for prostitution and brothels in his In Dublin magazine. He was fined 50,000 Irish pounds at the time, but the scandal made a severe personal and professional impact. An Irish Times report also claims that Hogan’s decision to step down as an early executive of Capital Radio was due to ‘making a mistake with regard to content’, though the article did not provide details on the incident.

CEO
  • Vivienne Nagle

    Vivienne Nagle has served as Managing Director of Onic radio stations FM104 and Q102 since 2023. She previously worked as a director for retail brands including Brown Thomas and Lifestyle Sports.

Editor-In-Chief
  • Kevin O'Mahoney

    Kevin O’Mahoney has served as Head of News and Sport for Dublin radio stations FM104 and Q102 since 2022, having previously served as a journalist for those stations. He graduated with a degree in journalism from the Technological University of Dublin (TUD) in 2016.

Other Important People
  • Dermot Hanrahan

    Dermot Hanrahan is a well-known Irish media executive with a wide-ranging influence in the radio and advertising sectors in Ireland. 
    Hanrahan was the first CEO of FM104 and served in that capacity until 2004 when the station was sold to Scottish Radio Holdings. Hanrahan also became involved in Ireland’s internet services industry in the 1990s, investing in Club Internet, an early internet provider. 
    After leaving FM104, Hanrahan remained heavily involved in the radio sector, becoming a key investor in Radio Nova, a rock music station, and serving on the boards of several other media companies, including Bay Broadcasting, which owns Classic Hits Radio and Radio Nova, and the Cork-based station Red FM. He remains chair of Radio Nova and Classic Hits. 
    Hanrahan also expanded his media interests into the advertising sector. In 2008, he founded Electric Media, an online advertising company that eventually became a leading firm, with clients including the BBC, Yahoo!, and The Irish Times. In 2009, a consortium led by Hanrahan also purchased Carlton Screen Advertising from ITV, the largest cinema advertising company in Ireland, which had 370 screens at the time. (Carlton Screen Advertising was rebranded as Wide Eye Media in 2014, which was rebranded as Pearl and Dean Ireland in 2022.) Then, in 2015, Hanrahan purchased the London-based cinema advertising firm, Pearl and Dean. According to the UK Companies House Register, Hanrahan remains the MD of Pearl and Dean (UK) as of 2025. This points to another connection with Bay Broadcasting. The latter is 50% owned by Step Investments, an Isle of Man-based firm led by Mike Ormonde. Step Investments lists both the UK and Ireland operations of Pearl and Dean on its portfolio, along with Bay Broadcasting and its radio stations.

ContactMacken House
40 Mayor Street Upper
Dublin
info@fm104.ie
+353 (0) 1 67 97 104
www.fm104.ie
RevenueMissing Data
Operating ProfitMissing Data
Advertising (in % of total funding)Missing Data
Market ShareMissing Data
Headlines
Meta Data

Historical Information about FM104 was obtained from a variety of news sources, including the Irish Times and RTE.

Ownership and financial information was gathered from annual filings with Core https://core.cro.ie/.

Information about Dermot Hanrahan, Mike Hogan, and Vivienne Nagle was obtained from profiles in news articles.

Accurate estimation of national market share was not possible because reporting on income levels in Ireland is typically done at the group level rather than the individual title level. Additionally, overall revenue details for the market as a whole are not available. Onic Audio Limited does not disaggregate the revenues of its individual stations in its annual filings.

Audience share is based on the report published by Joint National Listenership Research/IPSOS B&A in February 2026. It covers the period from January to December 2025. The latest results show 3.47 million listeners (15+) tune into radio every weekday – that is daily radio listening at 78.1% of all adults. Listening levels in the past week stand at 89.7% of the population. A total of c 16,750 people were interviewed during the survey period by Ipsos B&A, on behalf of JNLR - Joint National Listenership Research - that is commissioned by all national, regional and local radio stations, AAI, IAPI and Coimisiún na Meán.. Accurate estimation of audience share at a national level cannot be derived from published figures as Limerick Live operates in a local market.

Sources
Documents (PDF)
  • Financial Statement Capital Radio Limited (2025)
    Link File
  • Form A1 Capital Radio Limited (incorporation)
    Link File
  • 2025 Proxy Statement: Notice of annual meeting of stockholders
    Link File
  • Joint National Listenership Survey (2025)
    Link File