In 2004, 200 million songs were bought online in Europe and the United States, ten times more than the previous year, and sales generated by mobile music downloads amounted to more than $3.1 billion.
With the LogicaCMG solution installed on a mobile operator’s network, subscribers can use their mobile handset to identify, download and pay for music and other multimedia content, such as music video clips.
When users hear a favorite song played on the radio or a stereo, for example, they simply point their handset toward the source of the music and the mobile service will immediately identify the tune.
The subscriber then has the option to download a sample of the tune as a ringtone for their mobile handset, or to purchase the entire song in MP3 format.
A picture of the artist as a background image for the display screen is also offered, along with a subscription service to purchase other songs from the music charts.
LogicaCMG has conducted trials for the new solution with several mobile networks, including O2 Germany, which has been successfully using it as the basis for its "Musicspy" music recognition service for more than a year.
Chris McDermott, CEO of LogicaCMG’s telecoms business, said, "The mobile music market is really going to take off in 2005 and we expect to see the success of today’s iPod business will rapidly extend to music downloaded to mobile phones."
"The potential for network operators worldwide to generate new revenue streams from it is enormous. The boom in mobile music is yet to come and our technology solutions will make it easy for operators to make a headstart on this oppor-tunity," McDermott added.
The music recognition technology used by LogicaCMG is supplied by the Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology (IDMT), which also developed the MP3 format.
LogicaCMG’s solution supports all mobile communication channels, including SMS, MMS, WAP, streaming and voice portals. Consumers are able to use voice control to select and purchase digital content via a speech dialogue system.
Real-time transcoding ensures that the content is customized and compatible to the recipient’s mobile device.
Digital rights management (DRM), which is of such importance to the music industry, is also supported by LogicaCMG’s solution as it complies with the Open Mobile Alliance’s (OMA) DRM standards 1.0 and 2.0.
LogicaCMG also supplies the link to billing systems along with the music, making it easy for network operators to tap into additional sources of revenue.
An object-oriented framework facilitates integration into the existing business processes. Content from different providers can be bundled into a single offering.