EMERYVILLE, CA -- (MARKET WIRE) -- 09/13/07 -- While consumers continue to enjoy music
services on their mobile phones, they're increasingly using handsets to
identify songs heard in restaurants, clubs or on their car stereo and then
purchase ring tones, songs, wallpaper and other related content. Through
the acquisition of Musicphone technology, Gracenote®, a decade-long
leader in music identification, makes this capability available to all
major mobile carriers and handset manufacturers.
The Musicphone technology acquisition enhances Gracenote's customizable
mobile media platform, Mobile Music 2.0, and extends its customer base to
include AT&T and Virgin Mobile USA. Using a short code to dial into the
Interactive Voice Response (IVR) service, virtually any cell phone can
transmit a snippet of music to be identified by the Gracenote Mobile
MusicID service. Gracenote's mobile media platform provides not only song
or album information, but links to allow purchasing of the track or other
artist-related products, connections to the artist fan site, or in-depth
information about the artist or band. The Gracenote mobile media platform
is linked to the Gracenote global media database of more than 80 million
tracks, providing deep integration between the mobile phone and the music
experience, with products that enable music discovery, playlist generation,
and ecommerce.
"The entertainment and wireless industries are experiencing rapid
convergence and are looking for ways to integrate, monetize and deliver the
best mobile media services in a simple and compelling package," said Jim
Hollingsworth, senior vice president sales and marketing of Gracenote.
"We're integrating valuable IVR and commerce technology from Musicphone to
enhance our mobile media platform and provide further ecommerce
opportunities."
"Gracenote is an established player in mobile music and we're happy to have
them as our partner in offering music identification to over 4.8 million
customers," said Dominick Tolli, vice president, Mobile Data Services at
Virgin Mobile USA. "Mobile entertainment plays a key part in keeping them
engaged and entertained, and Gracenote provides an important slice of that
entertainment portfolio."
As an established mobile technology leader, Gracenote now powers music
services for leading carriers globally, including AT&T and Virgin Mobile
USA, KDDI in Japan, SKT and KTF in Korea, and France Telecom/Orange in
Europe. Gracenote also provides music identification technology and
services to handset manufacturers including Nokia, RIM, Samsung and Sony
Ericsson, as well as mobile music ISVs such as Sockets in Japan, Musiwave
in France, and Oi in Brazil. With Gracenote's presence in the mobile
industry globally, the company expects to ship its technology on hundreds
of millions of handsets in the next two years and process more than 25
million Mobile MusicID searches in 2007 alone.
About Gracenote
Gracenote is an established mobile technology leader in the global market,
powering mobile music services from the world's leading handset
manufacturers, including Nokia, Samsung, and Sony Ericsson. The company's
Mobile MusicID is built upon the industry standard for digital music
identification, Gracenote MusicID®, and is featured in hundreds of
millions of mobile phones and media players. MusicID connects with the
Gracenote Global Media Database, the largest database of music information
with more than 80 million tracks, to identify songs from CDs, mobile
phones, the Internet, and within music videos. Headquartered in Emeryville,
California, Gracenote has offices in New York, Tokyo, Berlin and Seoul. For
more information about Gracenote, please refer to
www.gracenote.com/corporate/.
Gracenote and MusicID are registered and Mobile MusicID is a trademark of
Gracenote. All other names are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of
their respective owners.
For More Information Contact:
Veronica Skelton
Concept Communications for Gracenote
415-342-3435 Email Contact
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