James Delahunty
26 Sep 2009 14:50
Microsoft Corp. has reportedly informed wireless carriers by letter that they can no longer use the Musiwave mobile tunes service once their contracts expire, a source told The Register. Musiwave drives more than 50 million downloads a year for the likes of T-Mobile, Vodafone, and Orange. It has licensing deals with the major record labels covering 3.3 million tracks and 250,000 artists.
The service underpins music, video and ringtone services operated by wireless carriers around the world (but not in the U.S.). The report seems to indicate that Microsoft is incorporating Musiwave into the Zune Marketplace and Xbox 360 games console - making it a Microsoft-exclusive technology that compares somewhat to Apple's iTunes exclusivity.
Musiwave's withdrawal from wireless carriers opens up the market for rivals such as RealNetworks and Livewire Mobile. "We're building a team in Redmond to help power Zune Marketplace," reads another Musiwave listing. "This job would work towards the overall strategy and collaborate closely with the Zune Redmond team and the Musiwave Paris team."