Nokia’s Unlimited Music Offer Grabbing Attention

December 4, 2007 – 3:22 pm

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It hasn’t been long since Nokia’s offer of unlimited downloading of music hit the streets, but it’s already a shot being heard ’round the world. Their approach is a direct challenge to the current pay-per-track method that is the norm.

The world’s biggest cellphone maker announced a deal on Tuesday with top record label Universal that will give customers buying particular Nokia devices unlimited access to millions of tracks for a year and allow them to keep the music afterwards.

Nokia hopes the deal with Universal Music Group — a unit of Vivendi whose artists include 50 Cent, Sting and Mariah Carey — will be followed by deals with the three remaining major international labels, to whom it is already talking.

Such unlimited download models could offer a shot in the arm to the music industry, which is struggling to find ways to make up for falling CD sales — something that pay-per-track online stores like Apple’s iTunes have so far failed to do.

Nokia’s plan is to push the adoption of digital music to new levels. In order to accomplish this, the Finnish company feels the cost must be low enough to gain widespread interest from consumers.

Mobile music is a small but growing segment of the music industry, that should exceed $11 billion by 2011. The competition in this burgeoning industry promises to get much rougher.

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