Ah, but they haven't had an issue in the past, unlike Apple. And I would say they are just copying Apple rather than wanting to get rid of FM which is relatively inconsequential to the manufacturing process. In other words, I think this is more of a design decision than to sell more music. If anything, they probably are looking to sell their fancy new bluetooth earbuds.
I don't think it has anything to do with Bluetooth earbuds. They have intrinsic value with/without FM Radio or headphone antennas.
The whole point of deliberately excluding FM radio is because it is
FREE! And it therefor competes with cell phone company and manufacturers paid services.
This issue is not going away by the way. It's going to come up again real soon with the rollout of ATSC 3.0,
Next Generation TV, being tested right now in Charlotte, NC and Washington, DC/Baltimore. Through this tech, you'll be able to watch your local TV station for
FREE via IPTV built within the ATSC 3.0 broadcast TV layer. The FCC might even mandate this technology at some point in phones, but at the moment, it's just being tested.
http://rabbitears.info/contour.php?appid=6&map=Y
Apple and any company with content media interests will have a conflict of interest in declining to use these technologies. Avoiding analog FM is much easier since its old technology and Digital HD Radio just hasn't caught on in America as expected, but the demand for local TV on tablets and cell phones will probably be much greater when the public first sees this. Keep in mind, because it's broadcast TV, there are no cell phone charges here. Even paid streaming content via ATSC 3.0 would be outside of the cellular spectrum, hence no use of WIFI or cell charges. The only requirement as of yet on local TV stations is that their free local broadcast of network programming or their main channel's programming be
FREE.
Now this only applies to the U.S., but ATSC 3.0 will be global in nature. South Korea already has it. Japan probably will soon. I have no idea what Europe's plans are as of yet.
And as I stated before even though people keep disputing this, FM radio is within the TV band, hence also within the cellular band as a whole.