HONG KONG – Technology giant Motorola Monday acquired South Asian online music provider Soundbuzz Pte.

Based in Singapore and serving a South Asian region stretching from India to New Zealand, Soundbuzz carries some 750,000 music tracks and hundreds of thousands of ringtones.

Headed by Sudhanshu Sarronwala, company operates under its own brand in some territories and supplies 'white label' digital music services to online and mobile phone companies. These include Indiatimes, Bharti/Airtel and TATA-VSNL in India; Telstra BigPond, Optus Zoo and Woolworths Group in Australia; and Singapore Telecom and M1 in Singapore.

Motorola launched its own digital music operation, Motomusic, two years in ChinaTaiwan. Motorola says that the acquisition of Soundbuzz will accelerate its activities in Asia quicker than if it tried to build local operations itself. The music market in Asia is understood to have grown by some 4-5% in 2007, in contrast with a likely decline in the rest of the world. and expanded that to Hong Kong and

Although it delivers to PC and mobile users, Soundbuzz currently sees some 90% of its sales generated via mobile channels, a proportion that is higher than Motorola but is seen as the direction that the industry is going. Last month it launched a new service that allows users to download tracks in standard and hi-fi versions with the consumer device choosing the most appropriate file size.

A Motorola spokesman said that both companies would also benefit from partnership between mobile handset manufacturer and mobile music provider.

Soundbuzz licenses its content from Sony BMG, EMI, Warner Music International and Universal Music Group, as well as over 45 independent record labels in Asia, including Saregama, Tips, Venus, Inreco and T-Series from India; Star Records, Universal Records, RS Promotion in South East Asia; and Shock, Central Station and Roadshow in Australia.

Motorola says it intends to maintain Soundbuzz's Singapore headquarters. Value of the transaction and details of Soundbuzz's financial performance were not disclosed, though a Motorola spokesman said that acquisition cost will be revealed in a future results filing after the deal has been completed.

© Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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