Last week’s news that Spotify was to take over streaming music duties on Sony’s PlayStation Network marked the death of the Japanese company’s own five-year-old Music Unlimited service.
Music Unlimited had been powered by Omnifone’s white-label B2B cloud platform since its launch in December 2010. Its closure in March will mark the loss of Omnifone’s biggest client to date.The PlayStation Network, and its 64 million registered users, is moving elsewhere.
It’s not the only recent troubling news for the company: rival B2B tech solution business 7Digital is now handling some newer international accounts for fast-growing Australian music service Guvera – although Omnifone still powers the platform in 18 countries.
Meanwhile, another key client of Omnifone’s, Blackberry’s BBM Music platform, was closed after just a year-and-a-half in summer 2013. The service allowed users to share their music amongst their BBM friends, and remains a project that Omnifone proudly calls “one of the most innovative series we have ever developed”.
So what’s next for Omnifone? With Sony switching to Spotify, is the B2B Cloud music service against the ropes?
Jeff Hughes, CEO of Omnifone (pictured), says very much not.
“We’ve signed six new customers in just six months – two of which are bigger than Sony and have ambitions beyond that of any current music service”
Jeff Hughes, CEO, Omnifone
For starters, he tells MBW, there are UK-based Omnifone’s other existing clients – including Neil Young’s much-discussed HQ audio project Pono.
Omnifone provides Pono with its online download store, and has no doubt benefitted from the $6.4m Young and his team raised on Kickstarter to fund Pono’s launch.
Omnifone’s MusicStation platform also provides a content distribution service for MySXM – a personalisation feature from the hugely popular US digital radio station Sirius XM. And it’s also behind Rara.com, the streaming service that aims to tackle a mass-market audience with an ‘easy to use’ interface.
But according to Hughes, the most exciting elements of Omnifone’s business in 2015 are yet to be announced.
He tells MBW: “As a result of the realignment of Sony’s music strategy, Omnifone and Sony have agreed to reduce the level of support related to Music Unlimited.
“We’ve known about it for some time and have since signed six new customers in just six months, two of which are bigger than Sony and have ambitions beyond that of any current music service.”
Hughes refuses to divulge the names of this mysterious duo of new clients, but describes them as “household names… both large technology companies taking bold steps into music”.
He adds: “After investing in the innovation of our cloud music platform, we are now nimble enough to support the entirety of the digital music industry and beyond and our current customer portfolio reflects this.”
Hughes reveals that in addition to Pono and his pair of “household names”, Omnifone has also signed a deal “to assist a content owner as well as a background music provider” and soon hoped to announce a separate agreement with “a high profile brand moving into digital music.”
He adds: “We’re also in a position to support the requirements of any of the big streaming players, including Spotify which is already a customer, no matter how small or big their requirements are.”
“We’ve built the race track and more new customers are joining it faster than ever.”Music Business Worldwide
