• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, April 20, 2006

Arbitron, which is betting big on the rollout of its portable people meter audience measurement technology, spent nearly $10 million on research and development related expenses during the first quarter of 2006, the company said in an earnings statement released this morning.

That represents a 24 percent increase over the first quarter of 2005, and no doubt was related to the company's deployment of the PPM system in Houston and its plan to introduce it in top 50 U.S. markets, as well as the implementation of an ambitious test of the Project Apollo system with VNU.

Total expenses related to those research initiatives, as well as other costs boosted Arbitron's total expenses for the quarter to $53.7 million, an increase of 20.9 percent from the first quarter of 2005.

Arbitron, meanwhile, faces potential competition in the radio measurement marketplace, including an aggressive market test of a so-called "smart cell phone" system being pushed by rival The Media Audit.

On Wednesday, TMA announced that Houston's largest ad shop, Fogarty Klein Monroe, has signed up to review the Smart Cell Phone test results from the test, which begins in May. The technology, which TMA is licensing from Europe's Ipsos, is the basis for TMA's bid to win a radio audience measurement proposal from a group of broadcasters organized by Clear Channel Radio. Arbitron and Mediamark Research Inc. are the other contenders.