OD2 Branches Further Into Europe With Italian Subsidiary

[seraph]

Music downloading pioneer OD2 announces today the opening of an office in Milan, Italy further extending the company's geographic reach on mainland Europe. OD2 already has two offices in the UK - in London and Bristol as well as Paris and Cologne.

Coinciding with the office opening, Carlo Galassi has been appointed General Manager of OD2 Italy with responsibility for aggregating local repertoire from record companies and managing and expanding OD2's retail client base in Italy. Before joining OD2, Galassi was Marketing Director of Universal Music Italia where he has spent 10 years in a number of roles including promotion, marketing and new media.

Ed Averdieck, OD2's European Sales & Marketing Director, said: "OD2 has seen a massive increase in the demand for legal digital downloads from Italian consumers. The opening of OD2 Italy will ensure our retail partners have the widest local and international repertoire available, so Italian consumers can download the music they want at a fair price."

The opening of the Italian office follows the January 26 launch of OD2's revolutionary SonicSelector digital music platform at the Midem 2004 music trade show. SonicSelector is a next generation application which enhances the Windows Media Player and enables consumers to listen to, organise and buy online legal digital music seamlessly.

SonicSelector uses Windows Media Player technology to allow consumers to download music - legally - from Europe's largest online catalogue and either burn tracks to a CD or transfer them to more than 60 portable digital music players which support the platform.

OD2, founded in 2000 by Peter Gabriel and Charles Grimsdale, now has more than 260,000 tracks available for streaming and downloading. The repertoire is licensed from all five major music labels and over 100 leading independent labels across Europe.

OD2's retail partners include: Coca Cola, MSN, HMV, Virgin, Wanadoo Group, TDC, Belgacom, Tiscali, MTV, Planet Media Group, Karstadt, Mediamarkt, Ministry Of Sound & Prisa Group.
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