the hearing, in November, the Competition Appeal Tribunal rejected Global's appeal, meaning it would have to sell some stations in order to complete the takeover. Global announced in December that it would not appeal the decision, and would instead begin the process of selling the assets as directed by the commission. Global announced on 12 August 2013 that Real and Smooth would relocate their London and West Midlands offices to Global premises. Smooth Radio's output was relocated to Global's Leicester Square headquarters from 1 October, a move that coincided with a major overhaul of its schedule, and the closure of Smooth 70s after 21 months on air. On 4 February 2014, the Radio Today website reported that Ofcom had given Global Radio permission to remove Smooth from the Digital One platform, and to replace it with a service playing music from the 1970s, 80s and 90s. Under this agreement, Smooth would continue to broadcast on its regional frequencies, but would be required to provide seven hours of local output per day. On 6 February, Global confirmed the sale of eight of its regional stationsincluding those with the Smooth Radio brand in the North West, North East and East Midlandsto the Irish media holdings company Communicorp. Under a franchising agreement between the two firms, these stations would retain the Smooth Radio name, but relaunch airing a mixture of both regional content and networked programming from London. Smooth would also take over Gold's medium wave frequencies, except in London, Manchester and the East Midlands. Global announced later that month that Smooth would be relaunched from 3 March, and subsequently confirmed the Gold changes would take effect from 24 March, when the stations would begin simulcasting with Smooth Radio London. This also coincided with the return of local programming at breakfast and drivetime. Audience and ratings Smooth Radio catered mainly for listeners over the age of 40, a similar audience to that of BBC Radio 2. Official quarterly audience figures collated by Radio Joint Authority Research Limited (RAJAR) show that the station had an average weekly audience of just over 3 million listeners. Figures for the third quarter of 2010, released in October 2010 showed that collectively, the six regional Smooth stations had a weekly audience of 3 million at the time Smooth became a national broadcaster. John Simons, Group Programme Director for GMG Radio said, "The scope for Smooth Radio is huge