IDG Ventures Europe, the technology venture capital company, announces today that over €6 million has been raised for Shazam Entertainment, the award-winning mobile music recognition company. The round was led by IDG Ventures Europe and the majority of the funds came from IDGVE and Lynx Capital Ventures, both of whom invested in the last round when €7.5 million was raised.
Shazam has developed the world's first ever real-time song identification service that works everywhere. Over a third of a million consumers have already used the service since it launched in the UK in late 2002. Shazam is in the process of rolling out the service with Vodafone in Germany. The funds will kick start the next phase in the development of Shazam's business which includes:
- Continuing to build the Shazam service to become the market leader for mobile music applications and services. In addition to the core 2580 recognition product, Shazam will offer Songmail - a service that allows users to send a 30 second song clip to a friend's mobile as well as ringtones and CD purchases
- International expansion into Asia, Europe and North America
- Expanding the core Shazam technology into a range of non-consumer services such as advertising monitoring, royalty tracking and information services for music publishers
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Ajay Chowdhury, Managing Partner, IDG Ventures Europe, says: "Shazam is one of the few consumer technology developments from the past year that is a true innovation in the industry. Our continued investment in the company demonstrates our belief in its future success not only as an international consumer service but also for the business applications of the technology."
Kenneth Ibbett, Managing Partner, Lynx Capital Ventures, adds: "There is huge potential for consumer services that deliver music and mobile applications. We are therefore delighted to re-invest in Shazam so that the company can take advantage of these opportunities in the UK and in other markets."
Jerry Roest, CEO of Shazam Entertainment, concludes: "This funding marks investor confidence in Shazam and will help us to build on our ability to drive ARPU for operators and provide labels with innovative new ways to sell music. We will be launching new products and services to support this strategy as well as developing our international plans. We also have some very exciting partnerships with media brands and other deals to announce shortly. •
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