Music Choice grows with acquisition of Xtra Music
Music Choice Limited, Europe’s longest established and leading digital music provider, has acquired Xtra Music Limited, the European distributor of DMX’s digital audio channels on satellite, cable and broadband across Europe.
The purchase from Maxide Music, Inc. and LGI Ventures B.V (part of Liberty Global Group), for an undisclosed amount, brings Music Choice’s unrivalled breadth of music channels into four million more homes, boosting the audience to 40 million households and extending coverage in over 8 European countries, including Austria, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Ukraine and Turkey among others.
With its award-winning programming team taking over on 31 March, Music Choice is set to transform the quality of the music service enjoyed both by distributors and their subscribers. Tracks on Xtra are presently selected using an automated operation out of the United States and provided to each country with no localisation. That will change when dozens of Music Choice music specialists around the world bring their musical knowledge and experience, particularly in local music, to the services. With a proven track record in aligning music channels to local tastes, Music Choice will provide unique music services to individual clients in the different European markets. Additionally, the Xtra brand is to be phased out, with the more recognised Music Choice brand taking its place.
Music Choice’s technology and infrastructure, provided by HP, promises greatly improved digital audio quality and opens up the possibility of exciting new services for the newly acquired markets. With its mission to make digital music easy both for distributors and their subscribers, Music Choice now plans to offer an extended portfolio of products beyond its
existing successful audio business.
For Chief Executive Margot Daly, who began her digital music career at DMX, the acquisition completes a career circle and a long held personal ambition. She says: “The digital music business is hugely different to what it was even a few years ago and to keep innovating and serving customers, a business such as Xtra requires scale. Realistically it is unable to build on its subscriber base profitably without consolidating with a larger player. Now, combined with Music Choice’s more extensive footprint, together we can do so much more. The long, competitive battle between DMX and Music Choice is finally over and I’m pleased to welcome Xtra into the Music Choice fold.”
