Founded originally in 1972 as Clear Channel Communications by Lowry Mays and Red McCombs (with the iHeartRadio digital platform officially launching later in 2008), iHeartRadio came into being to offer a massive, unified network of audio and news to listeners nationwide. The idea sparked when Mays and McCombs decided to buy a single struggling local radio station in Texas to turn it around, eventually realizing they could scale this successful business model to hundreds of stations across the country. After a major corporate rebranding to reflect the digital age, the site and app continue to operate today under the ownership of the publicly traded company, iHeartMedia, Inc. Today, iHeartRadio is run by a large corporate team of executives, broadcasters, and journalists, and is focused on a massive spectrum of audio entertainment and daily news. Because they aggregate thousands of local and national stations, they cover a huge variety of topics, diving deep into national politics, local sports broadcasting, pop culture, breaking news, and the music industry. They're based in San Antonio, Texas, and have made a name for themselves among college students, daily commuters, and digital listeners looking for a convenient, all-in-one platform for their daily audio happenings. One interesting fact: A unique fact about iHeartRadio is its sheer dominance in the modern podcasting space. Even though the company's roots are in traditional, old-school AM/FM radio broadcasting, it successfully adapted to the internet era and is currently the number-one podcast publisher in the entire world, generating billions of downloads annually and outperforming many massive tech companies!