MP3.Com Plans Initial Public Offering Sometime in '99, CEO Says
Bloomberg News
March 7, 1999, 11:16 a.m. PT
MP3.Com Plans Initial Public Offering Sometime in '99, CEO Says
New York, March 7 (Bloomberg) -- MP3.com, a distributor of
music over the Internet, plans to sell shares to the public
sometime before the end of this year, Chief Executive Michael
Robertson said.
MP3.com, founded in November 1997, is named for the popular
technology that enables people to easily download CD-quality
music over the Internet, mostly for free and currently without
regard for royalties or copyrights. MP3.com says its Web site
attracts more than 200,000 visitors a day and that it's signed up
more than 6,000 artists and independent record labels to sell
music over the site.
MP3.com is at the center of an escalating controversy in the
music business over the future of digital music. The music
industry is scrambling to set standards for online music delivery
in order to gain control over this new distribution channel,
which many people believe will eventually become as commonplace
as compact discs or tape cassettes.
The music industry ''either needs to get in on the game or
watch the entire industry go to somebody else,'' Robertson said
in an interview at this weekend's New York Music and Internet
Expo, a conference for musicians and technology companies.
MP3.com is trying to sell itself as an alternative to the
big record companies for fans who want inexpensive, or free,
music over the Internet, and smaller musicians, who are
frequently overlooked by major record labels.
''There are two classes here -- the music industry, which is
interested in protecting its distribution, and the Internet
crowd, which is more focused on the consumer and the independent
artist,'' Robertson said.
MP3.com isn't worried that its namesake technology will
become obsolete because the company intends to adapt to new
technologies as they develop, Robertson said.
''MP3.com is the next MTV, except it will grow much
bigger,'' Robertson said in his keynote address.
--Kim Chipman in the New York newsroom (212) 318-2300 through the |
