Major domestic groups Emap, Guardian Media Group and Chrysalis are also interested, with Chrysalis submitting two bids.
Two Asian radio companies, Asian Sound Radio and Sunrise Radio, are among the smaller bidders.
The rest are Absolute Radio in partnership with Irish media group Communicorp; CN Radio; and UK One.
There was no application from UTV, which has explained that it had second thoughts about its speech radio bid on the back of research into the Manchester market.
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