Songkick is effectively closing down and only seeking court victory against Ticketmaster in a bid to recoup some of its losses, according to a source cited by the Amplify website.
Songkick sold off its event discovery app and website to Warner Music Group’s owner Access Industries last month, but its ticketing arm was kept out of the deal because of the complications brought about by its legal action against Ticketmaster and Live Nation.
However, the Songkick source told Amplify that the sale was more akin to a liquidation, with most staff having been laid off and the company simply fulfilling existing contracts and no longer accepting new customers.
Songkick’s legal action against Ticketmaster is set to go to trial in November. Songkick first filed a lawsuit in 2015 when it accused Ticketmaster and Live Nation of anticompetitive acts. Papers filed said that artists who had used the ticketing platform in the past had seen their Ticketmaster featured pages abruptly removed.
However, in February an extra dimension was added when Songkick submitted new claims that staff at Ticketmaster stole trade secrets from the start-up and used them to develop its own rival service.
Songkick alleges that Ticketmaster’s director of client relations Stephen Mead used his position as a former employee of CrowdSurge – with which it merged in 2015 – to steal data.
The Amplify source said the recent slashing of head count should help it reach the trial date without going out of business. However, the Amplify source said exorbitant outgoings, such as expensive flights and the retainment of legal teams and PR firms means the company has all but spent the $60m it raised from investors.
“The biggest thing they did was the Adele pre-sale and that generated about $80m for them in total sales, but we estimated they probably lost $200,000 to $300,000 trying to execute their end of the agreement,” the Songkick source told Amplify.
“Fan club ticketing doesn’t scale, at least not the way [CEO] Matt [Jones] thought it would. The money they were making just doesn’t add up to the money they raised.”
Digital Music News said that the company has yet to respond to the accusations.
IMAGE: tpsdave
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