EMI Review & Exec Layoffs Continue. Cinema Synergies Sought.
GOAL IS TO TRANSFORM RECORD COMPANY INTO A MUSIC GROUP
Terra Firma/EMI’s Guy Hands is continuing his review of the major label group with a a new corporate vision statement and plan forward due just a few weeks from now.
Executive layoffs continue with Ian Hanson, who was promoted to COO last January, left the company just before Christmas. Chief Information Officer James Anderson will leave soon according to a report from the UK’s Telegraph. Jo McCollum, the head of human resources, left late last year.
In an effort to find new marketing avenues for the label, Hands is planning broadcast of live concerts by EMI artists into hundreds of Terra Firma owned Odeon and UCI movie theaters across Europe.
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Ask AEG/Regal how much “live” music in theaters drops to the bottom line.
It’s a pity that Terra Firma has sold Thorn shortly before buying EMI. They could have rebuild Thorn EMI …
Humm…interesting hints of ‘synergy’ on the distribution front, but I wonder what happens to creative-driven businesses that are taken over and managed by financial process types. Private equity people seem qualified to manage statistical controls and other spreadsheet tools, but can they grasp and deliver the ‘heart’ of a business like music? Or maybe they simply redefine that core away from creativity, and give us somethign else? Where does brand and marketing reside in such a new reality? I’m fascinated by what’s happening at EMI and how it mirrors the slashing/marketing avoidance at automaker Chrysler, which was bought out last year. Is private equity really smarter than everyone else? I’ve pondered this a bit at DIM BULB, if you’d like to check it out: http://dimbulb.typepad.com/my_weblog/2008/01/greed-is-good.html