Full-track, AYCE MusicStation includes data charges for EUR2.99 a month
Rating: stay tuned
By Annie Turner
It’s been four years in the making, but the launch couldn’t be better timed. Just after Apple’s new iPhone, in combination with the world’s biggest download site iTunes, looked like it might corner the market in mobile music, cutting the operators out altogether, Omnifone is launching a viable option in which operators will play a central role.
This is the deal; for GBP1.99 or EUR2.99 per week, subscribers to MusicStation can download as many tracks as they like, that’s complete tracks, and the data charge is covered by the fee. Omnifone has signed contracts with 23 operators who between them have a total of 690 million customers in 40 countries (by comparison, at the end of the first six months of 2006, Apple said it had sold some 16.5m iPods in total). The first two to go live will be South Africa’s Vodacom and Scandinavian operator Telenor.
So far operators have been no-hopers in the music market; Omnifone’s 23 operator partners have an average of just six tracks per year per user. This should change dramatically, as according to Mr Lewis, about 70% of existing mobile phones should be able to use the service on 2.5 and 3G. Omnifone has also teamed up with Mobiltron Asia Pacific to enable its operator partners to source factory-enabled handsets or customise existing handsets.
Omnifone won’t release the names of all the operators involved, but says it won’t be offering the service in the US (the user interface apparently looks very like the world’s favourite MP3 player…).
Omnifone’s CEO and serial entrepreneur Rob Lewis told GoMo News, “In some countries, there will be more than one network offering the service,” whereas Apple is signing exclusive deals within countries with one operator. Those who have signed up to MusicStation between them have subscribers in the following countries: Australia, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Turkey and the UK.
This is probably the most sensible single thing they’ve done since shelling out huge amounts of money for 3G licences.
Mr Lewis also says that there are around 1.2m tracks available in each country and that the content includes tracks to suit local tastes in each. Users can build playlists and make recommendations, as well as receive automatically generated recommendations. Indeed MusicStation has been designed to foster a community, encouraging interaction between subscribers, rather than just a download service, to make it stickier. Previously most of the interaction between music fans was illegal file sharing.
For EURO3.99 or GBP2.99, users can subscribe to the premium service which means they can also download unlimited tracks to the PC or Mac as well as their phones.
The plan is that by the time the iPhone and its Apple-orientated music offering hits Europe in November, MusicStation will already be well-entrenched. It looks like a win all round, well, apart from Apple, of course.
Stay tuned, this is hot off the press and GoMo News will be following this closely and exploring MusicStation in more detail in the March issue of The Mobile Advertising & Search Analyst (MAMA).
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