BEATPORT HALTS AUCTION AND CLOSES NEWS AND STREAMING SERVICES
There’s a lot going on at Beatport this week...
Beatport has announced that the previously detailed auction of the site has been “suspended”, whilst also revealing that they will close a number of services including Beatport News, its mobile app, streaming service and the Events section of the site on Friday.
Beatport’s parent company SFX Entertainment filed for bankruptcy in February this year, and the latest move from the online music retailer is an effort to focus on what it calls the “flagship” part of their business, the Beatport Store.
In a statement on the company’s website, Beatport said, “When Beatport was acquired three years ago, part of the vision was to create a broad digital platform for DJs to engage fans of electronic music wherever they may be.
“The original Beatport Store and the Beatport brand became the foundation for this vision, upon which we added a streaming music service, mobile app, a video livestreaming platform, and a relaunched news and media property.
“We have learned through this process however, that in our effort to be so many different things, we lost focus on bringing the best possible service and capabilities to our most loyal customers: the DJ community.
“As such, we have determined to invest in what is most important to our business and our customers, rather than adding yet another choice to a sea of streaming services.”
Today Beatport also announced that it will stop its distribution service for record labels, Baseware Distribution, also from Friday, with all clients signed to the service seeing their contracts cancelled.
In an email to labels that announced the closure, Beatport said, “We encourage you to negotiate a new arrangement with another distribution service to ensure your future releases are addressed.”
In February, financial reports from SFX Entertainment revealed that Beatport made a loss of $5.5m (£3.82m) in 2015, having seen a drop in revenue from $46.5m (£32.2m) in 2014 to $39.1m (£27.1m) last year.
Rob McCallum is DJ Mag’s digital news writer. Follow him on Twitter here.
