EMIEMI has shaken up its senior management and ousted a couple long standing significant players. With music revenue down an additional 10%, shares down 26% and digital music only accounting for 8.5% of total sales, the picture is bleak for EMI right now. Hence the change in management.

However, it was just a change, not actually bringing in new blood; instead just shifting responsibility around. One would think that when market bells toll to such a worrisome extend that there would be more dramatic changes, but maybe there is more to come. I highlighted earlier that there needs to be a change, in management, in culture and willingness to change distribution tactics in the Majors for them to realize the potential revenue from on-line sales. This could be the opportune time to jump in to the Major space. We reengaged EMI last week and are in the process of re-starting our license negotiations with them. Our take on it - allow us a license for anything you can in an open MP3 format from your current digital catalog and as much as possible from your back-catalog. If you can’t do everything, that is ok, we’ll take what you can give us now. We’ll see what happens in the next couple weeks, it might be the right time for EMI to implement some distribution changes, if we hand them an elegent want to action it.

Originally published on WordPress on January 12, 2007. Migrated to this blog on May 29, 2025.