(13 May 2009 10:10 pm)

MUMBAI: The Indian Music Industry (IMI) has launched Music Mobile Exchange (MMX), its world mobile licensing arm, in a bid to fight piracy.

With this initiative, mobile store owners can now get legitimate licence from the right holders and then sell the music without violating the Copyright Act.

MMX has already signed seven members - Saregama, Aditya Music, Tips, Venus, EMI, Sony and Universal.

IMI secretary general Savio D’Souza said, “Mobile phones and chips are growing at a phenomenal pace and India should have the largest base of mobile phone users in the next few years. Each of these users requires music on their phones. The shopkeepers are currently offering these services illegally and making million of rupees."

"The seven major members of the music industry have offered a legitimate partnership opportunity for these shopkeepers. We hope a number of shopkeepers will partner with the music industry and obtain the license. In case these shopkeepers do not obtain the licences, anti-piracy action will continue unabated,” D’Souza added.

The licence can be obtained for a period of 1-3 years at costs ranging between Rs 1,500 to 5,000 per month/per computer depending on the kind of shop and its location.

According to IMI, an independent survey conducted by the industry indicates that an average shopkeeper earns Rs 7,500-12,500 each month by music downloads and other music applications thus making the licence fee a reasonable amount and a profitable business for the shop owners.

'Music on mobile' includes products such as: ring tones - monophonic and polyphonic; true tones; ring back tones; full song mobile downloads, music videos, etc.

Mobile chip piracy refers to downloading music from the web or illegally copying them from cassettes or CDs and then transferring them to mobile phones.