Warner Music Group acquires selected assets of concert discovery app Songkick

Yesterday (July 14th), Warner Music Group announced that it has acquired selected assets of Songkick, a popular concert discovery app. These assets include its app, website, and trademark, but not its ticketing business or pending litigation against Live Nation and Ticket Master. 

As a result of the acquisition, Songkick's discovery app will be a standalone brand with WEA, WMG's artist and label services division overseeing it. Songkick employees with job functions relating to the app will now move over to WMG. In addition, Songkick's ticketing business will function under a new name in the near future. 

In a press release, Tony Harlow, the President of WEA had the following to say about the acquisition:

"Fans all over the world trust Songkick to help them find events featuring the artists they love. It’s a passionate, highly engaged music community, always on the lookout for new experiences. Bringing together Songkick's discovery platform and world-class technology with our existing ecommerce expertise and global reach represents a powerful step in strengthening and evolving our direct-to-fan capabilities."

According to reports, Songkick attracts 15 million users per month, making this a good move for WMG. By now having access to Songkick's high user base, the major music company will be better suited for direct-to-fan business. Not to mention, the ability to connect music fans to live concert experiences is becoming a trend. Earlier this summer, Eventbrite acquired Ticketfly from Pandora, which was followed by Spotify teaming up with Eventbrite to expand their concert recommendation capabilities.

SOURCE: Warner Music Group