Music Licensing Online: YouLicense

from TechCrunch by Duncan Riley

YouLicense aims to gain traction in the growing market for direct music licensing deals.

An online music licensing marketplace, YouLicense enables artists and those seeking musical content to conduct business directly without the need to deal with music companies.

Content is indexed and easily searchable. YouLicense provides standardized contracts so that both buyer and seller immediately know the legalities of a deal, allowing for a quick and easy transaction.

The obvious competitors to this site are the variety of Podcast focused free and paid music marketplaces. Whilst music licensed by YouLicense can be used for podcasts and other forms of web created content, the site aims at the full spectrum of music uses: Film & Television, Advertising Campaigns, Music on Hold, Mobile Phone Content and Audio Projects. Items offered are also not limited by format. Ringtones, sheet music and beats can be listed along with the traditional pre-recorded music.

The goal of YouLicense is to make music licensing and copyright trade a simpler and more direct process. Whilst the service is still in private beta testing, I gained access to the marketplace and it certainly looks like it’s going to deliver on its goals.

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PatentMonkey.com - Searchable Patent Database

from KillerStartups.com - published startups by ncapretz

Looking for a patent? Patentmonkey.com is a fully searchable US patent text database, with images and PDF documents as well. Whether the patent is active, expired, abandoned or pending, you can find it on this site. Of course there is a fee for this...$10 for a basic monthly membership or you can buy credits for a certain number of downloads. You can also bulk download patents on zip files, or email, post, or blog patents. They have a particularly informative blog on all the latest and greatest with patent disputes and issues, which would undoubtedly be of great interest to those dependent on patents for their business ventures. In their own words: PatentMonkey.com is a patent search and document downloading site built with smart user focused features and tools for the average user and the most experienced patent searchers. Users can quickly scan front pages, build a list of patents to save and download and then choose free single patent downloads or bulk downloads for a fee. PatentMonkey.com has a fully searchable data base of US issued patents with timely data updates. Why it might be a killer: This site is meeting a key niche of finding patents for entrepreneurs and those in other business ventures. The site is comprehensive, thorough and constantly in motion to make sure they are up-to-date and meeting their member's needs. Some questions: Can they make a profit charging only $10 a month membership? How many employees do they have to manage this ever-changing site? Are they open to redesigning the layout of the site, as it has a bland 2-color scheme and doesn't appear as professional looking as it should for a serious business. » original news

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10X Revenue (continued)

from A VC by Fred

I wrote a post about the recent ad network/ad infrastructure deals called 10x revenues several weeks ago.

Since then we've seen AQNT trade to MSFT (this morning) for $6bn which is 10x revenues.

But TFSM only got 3x revenues from WPP.

It's interesting that market leaders like DLCK, Right Media, and AQNT get 10x revenues but second fiddles like TFSM get 3x. That shows the power of market leadership for sure.

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Compete.com Rank and Visitors - stock photo peers

PictureSandbox is the BLUE line

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Microsoft Pays $6 billion for aQuantive: Massive Ad Network Consolidation Is Occuring

from TechCrunch by Michael Arrington

Breaking: Microsoft is acquiring advertising network aQuantive, the parent company to Avenue A | Razorfish, Atlas and DRIVEpm, for roughly $6 billion in an all-cash transaction, the company said this morning.

aQuantive is a public company (AQNT) and had a market cap of just $2.8 billion as of yesterday. The acquisition price of $6 billion is a roughly 2x premium on yesterday’s closing price, which is a reflection of the fact that this were competing bidders (see notes below). The acquisition comes after recent big acquisitions by Google and Yahoo in this space. Google bought Doubleclick for $3.1 billion in April. Later that same month, Yahoo acquired competitor RightMedia for $680 million. Just yesterday, WPP Group acquired yet another company in this space, 24/7 Real Media, for $649 million.

2006 revenues for aQuantive were $442 million. Net income as about $54 million.

aQuantive’s operating companies include both tools and ad agencies. The company is located in Seattle.

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