Live Nation Announces Ticketing Plans

Live Nation announced this morning that it will utilize CTS Eventim to launch its own ticketing business on January 1, 2009. The worldwide concert giant will exclusively license the Eventim platform in North America and Eventim will provide back office ticketing services in the UK and ticketing services across Europe. It has been known for months that Live Nation would exit its current deal with Ticketmaster.

The new deal with Europe’s largest ticketing service allows Live Nation to launch its own ticketing without having to start from scratch.  Now the company can control its own customer data, create enhanced ticket-based concert products and capitalize on expanded distribution channels and sponsorship opportunities. It will also spur traffic at the company’s hub LiveNation.com

The Eventim platform includes interactive seating maps, mobile distribution, integrated primary and secondary ticketing, alternative access models (auctions, lottery), print-at-home, radio frequency identification (RFID) ticketing and robust customer relationship management (CRM).  It is anticipated that Live Nation will offer the service to outside promoters who are expected to resist sharing data with their biggest competitor.

Live Nation will host an investor call in early January to present the details of the partnership.

Live Nation President and Chief Executive Officer Michael Rapino commented, "This is a monumental step forward in the evolution of Live Nation into a next generation music company. Eventim is the most technologically sophisticated ticketing platform in the world. Live Nation will use its most important asset, the concert ticket, to build artist careers and customer relationships, forge innovative sponsorship deals, create a fan and artist friendly secondary ticketing platform and provide a ticketing alternative for third-party venues. We believe that our partnership with Eventim will allow us to execute on this transformational vision."

CTS Eventim Chief Executive Officer Klaus-Peter Schulenberg added, "Eventim is at the forefront of ticketing innovation across Europe, and we share Live Nation’s passion for enhancing the fan ticketing experience. We will provide the infrastructure and technology required to reshape how Live Nation consumers access ticket inventory and enable ancillary revenue opportunities, while vastly improving the overall fan ticketing experience."