The group of minority shareholders who were opposing Jay Z’s €50m bid for streaming service Tidal have relented – and have now agreed to accept the entrepreneur’s offer.
That should leave the way clear for Project Panther Bidco – the investment group led by Jay Z aka Shawn Carter – to become the new legal owner of Scandinavian company Aspiro imminently.
The change of heart amongst the investor group, who were large enough to have potentially blocked Jay Z’s attempt to buy the company, was reported yesterday by Norwegian entertainment paper E24.
The leaders of the breakaway group, Sune Karlsson, Gunnar Mårtensson, Thomas Treitler and Sven-Olof Nilsson, said in an email: “We have together with the major shareholders decided that it is best to accept the bid.”
That brings the shareholders in line with Aspiro’s investment board. Project Panther Bidco reportedly requires at least a 90% controlling stake in the company for their bid to remain valid.
Aspiro AB posted a net loss of 84.1m SEK (€8.9m) for the last calendar year, off the back of a 22% increase in net revenues to 303.2m SEK (€31.9m).
Aspiro’s board of directors previously unanimously recommended accepting Jay Z’s offer, admitting that Tidal wasn’t profitable and “not fully funded for the coming 12 months”.Music Business Worldwide
