IRISH WEBSITE Muzu.tv will make its 85,000 music videos available on entertainment site Metacafe.com as part of a deal between the two companies.
The agreement means Muzu.tv will be able to increase its global reach significantly, according to chief executive Ciarán Bollard, who said it was a big step in its aggressive expansion plans.
“From next month there will be 85,000 videos available through Metacafe’s site, which gives us access to an additional 10 million people across Europe,” he said. “It’s a huge deal for us in terms of the reach they have and Metacafe is one of the fastest growing entertainment sites in the world.”
Launched in 2008, Muzu.tv has licensing agreements with the four largest record labels, which allows it to offers viewers and syndicated sites free access to legal music videos. Revenue is generated from advertising and a share of that goes to the labels and artists as well as the site.
According to Mr Bollard this deal is the first of its kind and will see the Muzu player being embedded on the Metacafe site, which draws about 45 million unique monthly viewers worldwide. Muzu.tv will retain full control over the content and in-video advertisements while the content will be integrated with Metacafe’s search and recommendation engines.
Mr Bollard said the company hopes the deal will give it a significant audience boost as it expands into new markets across Europe.
“We’ve proven the business model works in Ireland and the UK and now it’s just a matter of taking it to other places,” he said, adding that it had already seen promising growth in the Italian and Spanish markets.
Mr Bollard also said deals of a similar size to the Metacafe agreement could be finalised during the summer, which would help the site grow its worldwide audience even further. What he described as two “major” content deals were also being negotiated, both of which he hoped to able to announce in the second half of 2011. He said the company aimed to be at break-even point relatively soon despite difficult trading conditions.
“Our plan is to have broken even towards the end of the year but I would be hoping to hit that before then,” he said. “Obviously we’re focused on being here for the long term and like any company we have to battle our way through the recession.”
